The Influence of Bilingual Language Exposure on the Narrative, Social and Pragmatic Abilities of School-Aged Children on the Autism Spectrum

The team compared bilingual and monolingual school-age children with autism. They looked at story-telling, social use of language, and non-literal speech like jokes.

Kids were split by how much of each language they heard each day. The study asked: does two-language exposure change these skills?

Both groups looked the same on most tests. Children who heard both languages about equally scored a little higher on joke and idiom tasks.

Speaking two languages did not hurt narrative or social skills. If anything, balanced bilinguals had a tiny edge.

Phillips et al. (2024) saw the same neutral result in toddlers with ASD. Age, not language background, drove scores. Together the papers show safety across early childhood.

Boets et al. (2011) used the same design with Down syndrome and also found no harm. The pattern repeats across diagnoses.

So et al. (2019) showed robot play can lift narrative skill. Their gain came from teaching, not from cutting one language.

You can reassure families that keeping the home language will not slow progress. Keep teaching stories, jokes, and social rules in whichever language parents use best. If a child hears two languages daily, weave both into sessions instead of picking one.