Methodological Issues in Exploring the Ideas of Children with Autism Concerning Self and Spirituality

Abstract

This article considers the methodological challenges in attempting to hear directly from children with autism spectrum conditions about their views concerning spirituality and religion. We may seek these views on the grounds of children's rights, health/well-being and spirituality links, or of the neglect of faith groups in hearing directly from such children, or because these children's views may be fundamentally challenging in religious terms (such as difficulties in understanding the ‘other’ /‘Other’). Five pointers about methods are discussed, drawing on cognitive and developmental research. Additionally, children's right to silence is considered as well as the crucial importance of researcher reflexivity.

KEYWORDS:

• autism
• faith
• spirituality
• research methods
• methodologies
• reflexivity
• silence
• ethics

Acknowledgement: My thanks to the United Kingdom-based Autism and Research Group (ASPARRG) for our continuing lively exchanges concerning the topics within, and beyond, those in this article. My colleagues in the Autism Centre for Education and Research (ACER, University of Birmingham, United Kingdom) have also provided stimulating debate around the methodological issues discussed in this article.

Notes

1. Use of terms:

1. 1) The term spirituality is contentious and often ambiguous (sometimes used interchangeably with religion/religiosity/faith), but spirituality is used here to mean:

   (an) awareness of the transcendent (‘the beyond in our midst’), the awareness of something beyond intellectual knowledge or normal sensory experience … thus concerned with: meaning and purpose in life; interconnectedness and harmony with other people, planet Earth and the Universe; and a right relationship with God/a power or force in the Universe which transcends the present context of reality.

   (Diocese of Oxford 2008, 2316)

2. 2) This contrasts with the term religion:

   a shared framework of theistic beliefs and rituals that gives a social context within which spirituality is expressed and nurtured, and the meaning of life explored. (Diocese of Oxford 2008, 2316)

3. 3) The term autistic spectrum conditions is used to encompass the whole spectrum of autistic spectrum disorders/conditions (i. e., including classic autism and Asperger's) (see Baron-Cohen 2008).