Cage Eilidh, Howes Jack
Royal Holloway, University of London, UK.
University of Stirling, UK.
Autism. 2020 Oct;24(7):1664-1675. doi: 10.1177/1362361320918750. Epub 2020 May 31.
Many autistic people now go to university, but many of them also drop out of their studies. In fact, it is believed that autistic people are at higher risk of dropping out, but little research has been done to understand why this is happening. This research used interviews to take an in-depth look at 14 autistic people's experiences of dropping out of university. All the things the participants talked about were examined closely by the researchers who identified common themes in what the participants discussed. The first set of themes captured some overarching issues faced by autistic people, such as difficulties with getting diagnosed, a lack of autism understanding, mental health challenges and feeling like an outsider. The next themes were organised within challenges faced at university, including a feeling of culture shock, becoming disengaged from one's studies, a lack of proactive support from their university and a feeling that dropping out became inevitable. Finally, there were themes about life after dropping out, which involved a sense that the experience at university had been traumatic and shameful, but they believed people had to do what is right for them. All of these themes suggest that universities need to be better at supporting autistic people when they first come to university, and that they should actively offer clear support throughout and try and make the university environment more accessible for everyone, to ensure more autistic people have a positive university experience.
现在许多自闭症患者能够进入大学，但他们中的许多人也会辍学。事实上，人们认为自闭症患者辍学的风险更高，但对于为何会出现这种情况，相关研究却很少。这项研究通过访谈深入了解了14名自闭症患者的大学辍学经历。研究人员仔细审视了参与者所谈论的所有内容，并在他们的讨论中确定了共同主题。第一组主题涵盖了自闭症患者面临的一些总体问题，比如诊断困难、对自闭症缺乏了解、心理健康挑战以及感觉自己像个局外人。接下来的主题围绕在大学面临的挑战展开，包括文化冲击感、对学业失去兴趣、大学缺乏主动支持以及感觉辍学变得不可避免。最后，还有关于辍学后生活的主题，其中涉及一种感觉，即大学经历既痛苦又丢脸，但他们认为人们必须做对自己合适的事情。所有这些主题都表明，大学需要在自闭症患者刚入学时更好地为他们提供支持，并且应该在整个过程中积极提供明确的支持，努力让大学环境对每个人来说都更便利，以确保更多自闭症患者能有积极的大学体验。
