First, they tapped flashing letters faster when the letters spelled out sentences than when the letters made no sense. Second, they tapped letters that usually go together faster than letters that do not usually go together. This shows that they knew some spelling rules. Third, they paused before tapping the first letter of a new word. This shows that they knew where one word ended and the next word began. These results suggest that many autistic people who do not talk can learn how to spell. If they are given appropriate opportunities, they might be able to learn to communicate by typing.

About one-third of autistic children and adults cannot communicate effectively using speech, even after years or decades of interventions focused on speech (DiStefano et al., 2016; Tager-Flusberg & Kasari, 2013). For reasons that are not yet understood, some do not talk at all, some can say a few words or phrases, and others can speak but in a very limited way. Although some nonspeaking¹ autistic people can learn to use picture-based communication systems (e.g. Bondy & Frost, 2001), these systems are limited in that they are used primarily to make requests (Ostryn et al., 2008), the vocabulary available to a user is chosen by someone other than the user, and the evidence for their long-term efficacy is not robust (Howlin et al., 2007). Unfortunately, most nonspeaking autistic people are never provided access to an effective, language-based alternative to speech, significantly limiting their educational, employment, and social opportunities.

For people with acquired disabilities that make speech difficult or impossible (e.g. aphasia following a stroke), writing can become their preferred medium of expression (e.g. Thiel & Conroy, 2022). But fewer than 10% of people with congenital disabilities that significantly impact their ability to speak (including nonspeaking autism) are estimated to be literate (Foley & Wolter, 2010). In one large study, school professionals reported that fewer than 5% of their nonspeaking students from 3rd to 12th grade could write simple phrases or sentences (Erickson & Geist, 2016). Intrinsic factors (e.g. perceptual, cognitive disabilities) may contribute to the difficulties some nonspeaking people face in acquiring literacy. But nonspeaking autistic people also face at least three extrinsic challenges in acquiring literacy.

First, they have to overcome deeply entrenched assumptions that because they cannot communicate effectively using speech, they do not have the capacity for language. Speech and language have historically been conflated (Gernsbacher, 2004): A person unable to speak may be assumed to lack the capacity for symbolic thought that underlies language. But speech is only one means by which language can be expressed. Given appropriate instruction and support, deaf people, for example, can learn to convey their thoughts using sign language.

Second, most modern approaches to literacy instruction rely on speech. Recommendations for early literacy activities involve practicing letter–sound correspondences and decoding printed words by sounding them out (National Reading Panel, National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, 2000). Some literacy activities that do not rely on speech have recently been developed for nonspeaking autistic children (Benedek-Wood et al., 2016; Goh et al., 2013)—for example, computer games to teach printed word recognition or root word identification (Serret et al., 2017). But literacy activities for nonspeaking people have yet to be widely adopted (Arnold & Reed, 2019; Copeland et al., 2016).

Finally, many nonspeaking autistic people behave in ways that are inconsistent with expectations about how someone capable of becoming literate would behave. In addition to not being able to communicate effectively using speech, they may appear inattentive, have difficulty sitting still, or engage in impulsive or self-injurious behaviors (Tager-Flusberg et al., 2017). As adults, they may need support in activities like tying their shoes or crossing the street (Carter et al., 1998). They may have co-occurring movement disabilities that prevent them from being able to imitate, hold a pencil, mold their hands into signs, or consistently follow instructions (Leary & Donnellan, 1995). Their cognitive ability is vastly underestimated on conventional intelligence tests (Courchesne et al., 2015), many of which require spoken responses. As a result, nonspeaking autistic people may appear to be so disabled as to be incapable of acquiring literacy (Mirenda, 2003).

It is in this context that we conducted the preregistered study reported here. We asked whether, despite the significant challenges to acquiring literacy just outlined, some nonspeaking autistic adolescents and adults have learned English orthographic conventions. To answer this question, we developed a task to measure participants’ knowledge of spelling that did not require that they speak or generate text. Participants played a game that involved tapping sequentially pulsing targets on an iPad as quickly as they could. We compared how quickly they tapped targets on two types of trials: Trials where letters of the alphabet pulsed in a sequence that spelled a sentence the experimenter had earlier said aloud (e.g. “I should water the backyard today”) and trials where letters or nonsense symbols pulsed in closely matched but meaningless sequences. We reasoned that if participants knew how to spell, they would be faster to tap targets on trials involving sentences that had earlier been said aloud (because they could predict the sequence of pulsing letters) than trials involving meaningless sequences (where prediction was not possible).

As will be described below, the participants in our study were unable to communicate effectively using speech despite having received, on average, over 15 years of speech therapy. According to participants and their families, the most effective means of communication available to them involved spelling words and sentences by pointing to letters on a letterboard held vertically by a trained assistant. This method of communication has generated controversy because of doubts about nonspeaking autistic people’s capacity for literacy (e.g. Fein & Kamio, 2014) and concerns about whether they are pointing to letters they select themselves or letters the assistant has directed them to (e.g. American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA), 2018; but see Jaswal et al., 2020). The study here was not designed to evaluate the authenticity of this method of communication. But it is relevant to that debate insofar as it investigates whether nonspeaking autistic people who use this method know how to spell.

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