Thorpe David, McKinlay Marisa, Richards James, Sang Kate, Stewart Mary E
School of Social Sciences, Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, United Kingdom.
Faculty of Natural Sciences, University of Stirling, Stirling, United Kingdom.
Autism Adulthood. 2024 Dec 2;6(4):495-509. doi: 10.1089/aut.2022.0114. eCollection 2024 Dec.
Employment is a critical factor contributing to the well-being and quality of life of autistic people of working age. Historically, research has tended to focus on interventions and employment-related outcomes, typically generated without the input of autistic workers. Interventions often work to help the autistic worker fit into the working environment rather than it being adjusted for the autistic worker. However, a growing body of research reflects autistic workers' experiences of employment with consideration given to how the workplace should change to reflect the differences of this historically marginalized group.
This study is a systematic analysis of existing research that focuses on and prioritizes autistic workers' experiences of employment. Our analysis draws on the social relational model of disability (SRMD), an approach increasingly applied in contexts of autism and employment. We systematically searched five journal databases, resulting in 34 articles that reflect the lived experience of autistic people in employment.
We identified four themes through narrative synthesis: and . The results draw on the SRMD, revealing nuances to inclusionary and exclusionary employment for the autistic workforce.
Our findings encourage the prioritization of the voice of autistic workers when designing working environments. They also function as a critique of the traditional approaches that placed employers, managers, and human resource professionals as the dominant agents of decision-making. In these traditional practices, the burden of making employment viable was on the worker, rather than the employer. The results of this study framed through the SRMD allowed for enhanced understanding of the barriers and new insights into how to improve the employment experience for autistic adults.
就业是影响适龄自闭症患者幸福感和生活质量的关键因素。从历史上看，研究往往侧重于干预措施和与就业相关的结果，这些结果通常是在没有自闭症工作者参与的情况下产生的。干预措施通常致力于帮助自闭症工作者融入工作环境，而不是根据自闭症工作者的情况对工作环境进行调整。然而，越来越多的研究反映了自闭症工作者的就业经历，并考虑到工作场所应如何改变以适应这个历史上被边缘化群体的差异。
本研究是对现有研究的系统分析，重点关注并优先考虑自闭症工作者的就业经历。我们的分析借鉴了残疾社会关系模型（SRMD），这是一种在自闭症和就业背景中越来越常用的方法。我们系统地搜索了五个期刊数据库，得到了34篇反映自闭症患者就业生活经历的文章。
我们通过叙事综合法确定了四个主题： 和 。研究结果借鉴了SRMD，揭示了自闭症劳动力包容性和排他性就业的细微差别。
我们的研究结果鼓励在设计工作环境时优先考虑自闭症工作者的声音。它们也是对传统方法的批判，传统方法将雇主、经理和人力资源专业人员作为主要决策主体。在这些传统做法中，使就业可行的负担落在了工作者身上，而不是雇主身上。通过SRMD构建的本研究结果有助于更好地理解障碍，并为如何改善自闭症成年人的就业体验提供新的见解。
