Date Published: June 3, 2025

This is a SPARK Research Match Summary Report. It describes results from newly published research using data from SPARK participants.

Study title

Racial and Ethnic Group Differences in Service Utilization in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder: The Role of Parental Stigma

What was the study about?

Studies show that children of color often receive fewer services and therapies for autism. Researchers wanted to see if stigma affects the amount and types of services they use. Stigma describes the shame that societies may attach to people because of a disability or other reasons. This study focused on the stigma that parents experience because their child has autism. Researchers wanted to see how families from different backgrounds compare in their use of autism services and their experiences of stigma.

How was the research done?

More than 760 U.S. parents of autistic children ages 6 through 15 completed online surveys about stigma and their children’s services. Their races and ethnicities were: 42 percent white, 21 percent Latino/Hispanic, 17 percent Black, 10 percent multiracial, 7.5 percent Asian, and less than 3 percent Native American and other races. Researchers accounted for the influence of parents’ socioeconomic status — such as income and education levels — to make sure that the results were not just due to family finances.

What did the researchers learn?

• White and Asian parents were more likely to internalize stigma, which means that they blamed themselves for their autistic children’s struggles.¹
• When accounting for differences in socioeconomic status, Asian parents were less likely to completely use all services as recommended for their autistic child. They also said that services were less available to them.
• Like Asian parents, Latino/Hispanic parents were less likely to completely use all the autism services as recommended for their children.
• Latino/Hispanic parents and multiracial parents were more likely to report that their children had needs for treatment that were not being met.
• Some results changed when the researchers did not account for the influence of socioeconomic status. Black and multiracial parents, who often had lower incomes, were most likely to say that recommended services were unavailable. This suggests that socioeconomic factors may play a larger role than stigma does on their children’s services.

What was new and innovative about the study?

Few studies have examined stigma among families of different races and ethnicities who have an autistic child. This study is the largest one that surveyed families of different backgrounds about this topic and statistically analyzed the results.

What do the findings mean?

Stigma was not the main reason that families of color in SPARK used fewer autism services. The one exception was for Asian parents, where stigma partially contributed to their lower use of services. “Results indicate that socioeconomic factors interact with race/ethnicity to impact service use and stigma,” the study says.¹

What are people saying?

Study participants:

• “I appreciate the efforts of many professionals trying to understand the fundamentals of autism and, with knowledge, comes powerful resources to assist our loved ones on the spectrum.”
• “I love helping any way that I can, and love that all aspects are being looked at! Knowledge is power!!”
• “Interesting topic! It shows me that I need to do some more research so I can better understand my child’s diagnosis.”

Study researcher Karla Rivera-Figueroa, Ph.D., fellow, University of Colorado, Anschutz:

“Different groups have different barriers to services. For Black parents and multiracial parents, socioeconomic status may be the driving contributor for them not accessing services. But for Asian and Latino parents, there may be other factors like language and immigration status that are important to think about.”

Study researcher Inge-Marie Eigsti, Ph.D., professor, University of Connecticut:

“The good news here is that overall levels of stigma seem somewhat lower than we might have expected based on earlier studies. Part of this reflects the greater acceptance of neurodiversity, and people being more familiar with the concept of autism.”

What’s next?

The researchers hope that a better understanding of what increases and reduces stigma will help healthcare providers work more effectively with families. The researchers also collected data in this study that will be used to analyze a tool called the Low-Verbal Investigatory Survey for measuring communication skills in autistic children.

References

1. Rivera-Figueroa K. et al. Autism 29, 1171-1183 (2025) PubMed

About SPARK Research Match

This SPARK Program matches participants with research studies that they may want to join. These studies have been evaluated for scientific merit and approved by a scientific committee at SPARK. The program is free to researchers and participants. SPARK does not endorse or conduct these studies. Participants choose if they want to take part in a particular study.