Community participation of youth with intellectual disability and autism spectrum disorder.

Bao et al. (2017) asked parents of teens with autism plus intellectual disability and teens with ID alone how often their kids joined community activities.

The team counted the number of activities and how deeply the youth took part.

All families lived in the United States and answered the same survey questions.

Both groups signed up for the same number of clubs, sports, and faith events.

Yet the ASD+ID teens were far less involved once there; parents said social demands like talking to peers or following unwritten rules got in the way.

Simply offering more activities did not fix the gap.

McCauley et al. (2018) saw the same pattern: kids with ASD+ID scored lower than ID-only peers on friendship and social inclusion, a direct conceptual replication.

Lin et al. (2026) studied a whole national registry and also found that communication deficits, not physical issues, limited participation, extending the 2017 finding to a larger sample.

Reyes et al. (2019) seems to disagree at first glance; they reported that more sports and clubs meant more friends for kids with ASD. The key difference is measurement: N counted activity hours while A et al. measured real-time social involvement, so both can be true—kids can attend yet still feel left out.

When you write transition goals, do not just list “join two new clubs.” Add social-support objectives like greeting peers or asking to join a game. Break the hidden rules into small teachable steps, model them in the club setting, and collect data on initiations rather than attendance alone.