Parents' future visions for their autistic transition-age youth: Hopes and expectations.
Parents dream big for their autistic teens but freeze without a clear plan.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Krafft et al. (2019) talked to 42 parents of autistic teens who were about to leave high school.
Parents described the future they wanted for their kids in eight areas: jobs, college, friends, housing, health, money, fun, and safety.
The team recorded the interviews and sorted the answers into themes.
What they found
Every parent had bright hopes, but each hope came with a worry.
They wanted a job, yet feared no boss would hire.
They dreamed of independent living, but pictured their child lost and alone.
Most said no teacher, doctor, or case manager had given them a clear road map.
How this fits with other research
Billstedt et al. (2005) followed 120 autistic children for 13–22 years and found 78 % still needed daily help as adults.
Those hard numbers line up with the fears parents voiced in Krafft et al. (2019).
Lee et al. (2020) ran a strengths-based STEAM club and parents saw quick gains in confidence and friendships.
That small win shows hope can turn real when a program gives clear steps, backing up the main plea in Krafft et al. (2019).
Ghanouni et al. (2021) asked adults, parents, and staff what “independent living” really means.
They named three must-haves: stable mood, money skills, and community ties.
Those same three points show up in every parent quote in Krafft et al. (2019), proving the worries are shared across studies.
Why it matters
Your transition plan should start with parent hopes, then add the three concrete targets: emotional regulation, money handling, and community links.
Break each target into weekly goals and name the person who will teach it.
When parents see a step-by-step path, their hope stays and their fear shrinks.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
Researchers have documented that young adults with autism spectrum disorder have poor outcomes in employment, post-secondary education, social participation, independent living, and community participation. There is a need to further explore contributing factors to such outcomes to better support successful transitions to adulthood. Parents play a critical role in transition planning, and parental expectations appear to impact young adult outcomes for autistic individuals. The aim of this study was to explore how parents express their future visions (i.e. hopes and expectations) for their autistic transition-age youth. Data were collected through focus groups and individual interviews with 18 parents. Parents' hopes and expectations focused on eight primary domains. In addition, parents often qualified or tempered their stated hope with expressions of fears, uncertainty, realistic expectations, and the perceived lack of guidance. We discuss our conceptualization of the relations among these themes and implications for service providers and research.
Autism : the international journal of research and practice, 2019 · doi:10.1177/1362361318812141