A new US study has found that shared book reading at home is linked to stronger language skills in young autistic children, while screen time shows no clear association with language abilities. The research, published in Autism Research, suggests that reading together may help explain why children from higher‑income families tend to display stronger communication skills, although it does not indicate that screen use harms or helps development on its own.
Language development among children on the autism spectrum varies widely. Autistic individuals experience a broad spectrum of language outcomes, from delays in spoken language to skills that rival or exceed those of their neurotypical peers. Researchers say environmental influences in early development are increasingly important to understanding these differences.
Experts describe human development as shaped by layers of environment, from broad socioeconomic status to daily routines. Socioeconomic status encompasses factors such as household income and parental education, while everyday activities—like shared reading with a caregiver and the amount of screen time—are more immediate influences on a child’s experience at home. Shared book reading involves an adult reading aloud with a child and encouraging participation.
Screen time refers to the hours a child spends in front of screens such as televisions, tablets, computers or smartphones. In the general population, interactive home literacy routines have been linked to language growth over time, whereas excessive screen time has been associated with delays in some studies of neurotypical children.
Past research into autism and reading has suggested autistic children may engage with reading differently, sometimes focusing less on the reader’s face and more on background objects. This prompted researchers to ask whether typical reading patterns extend to autistic children and how home activities relate to language development in this group.
Lead author Meredith Pecukonis, an assistant professor in the Department of Psychology at Smith College and director of the Autism & Neurodevelopment Lab, emphasised the importance of understanding the home environment for autistic language outcomes. “Children with autism are likely to experience language delays and other challenges using and/or understanding spoken language that emerge early in childhood and sometimes persist into adulthood,” she said.
Pecukonis also noted the gap in U.S. data prior to the current study. “Prior to publication of our study, only three studies had looked at the association between screen time and language abilities in autistic children. All of these studies were conducted in China, and therefore no studies had been done in the U.S. on this topic. This gap in the literature was surprising to us, given that several studies have linked excessive screen time to language delays in neurotypical children, and autistic children engage in more screen time than their neurotypical peers.”
To map how socioeconomic status, reading habits and screen use interact with language development, the researchers analysed data from the National Survey of Children’s Health collected between 2018 and 2022. The nationally representative sample included 1,217 autistic children aged two to five, with data gathered through surveys completed by their parents or primary caregivers.
Socioeconomic status was captured through the highest level of parental education and the family’s poverty ratio based on income, while daily habits included how many days a week a parent read to the child and how many hours per weekday the child spent on electronic devices. Language was measured in terms of expressive and receptive skills, covering tasks such as speaking single words, asking questions and telling stories, as well as understanding instructions, pointing to objects and recognising initial sounds.
The findings showed that autistic children from higher‑SES households tended to have higher expressive and receptive language scores, were read to more often and spent less time on screens. Importantly, a direct link emerged between reading frequency and language abilities: more shared book reading at home correlated with stronger language skills overall.
Crucially, shared book reading partially explained the relationship between SES and language outcomes, suggesting that higher‑income families may benefit their children’s language development in part by engaging more in reading activities. Pecukonis described this as a bridge between a family’s broader resources and a child’s developmental gains: “Effect sizes are small, meaning that the environment has a small yet significant impact on language development in autism.”
She added that lower‑SES households might face practical constraints that limit reading time, such as work demands or access to books, and that addressing these disparities could support autistic children’s language development. “If we want to support autistic children’s language development, we need to acknowledge that children are shaped by various aspects of their environments,” she said, indicating that broader policy changes could help.
By contrast, the study found no statistical link between screen time and expressive or receptive language in autistic children. “We were really surprised that the association between amount of screen time and children’s language abilities was non-significant,” Pecukonis said. “This contradicts with what has been reported in the literature on neurotypical children.” She stressed that the lack of an association does not classify screen time as inherently good or bad for autistic children.
The findings contrast with some earlier PsyPost coverage of neurotypical preschoolers, which suggested that replacing shared reading with screen time could be associated with lower developmental scores, though the current study focuses solely on autistic children. Past general population studies in 2024 have linked higher screen time to poorer language skills, whereas the present results show a neutral effect for autistic children.
The researchers caution that the study relies on parent reports, which may be subject to bias, and captures only a single point in time rather than longitudinal development. They emphasise that it is not possible to claim causation from the observed associations.
Pecukonis and her colleagues stress that the aim is to document trends and highlight the environmental factors that matter for language development, rather than assign blame. They advocate for supporting autistic children through environmental adjustments and point to potential policy solutions to assist families with fewer resources.
The study’s authors, M. Pecukonis and A. Geffin, titled Socioeconomic Status and Quantity of Shared Book Reading, But Not Screen Time, are Positively Associated With Language Skills in a Nationally Representative Sample of Autistic Children, appear to confirm that both reading frequency and broader socioeconomic context play roles in language outcomes for autistic children, while screen time alone does not independently predict language abilities.
