Autism and mathematics education

Michiel Klaren, Birgit Pepin, Marieke Thurlings

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Michiel Klaren, Birgit Pepin, Marieke Thurlings. Autism and mathematics education. CERME 10,
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 Thematic Working Group 04

Autism and mathematics education

Michiel Klaren, Birgit Pepin and Marieke Thurlings
Eindhoven University of Technology, The Netherlands; m.j.klaren@tue.nl
Inclusive education urges educational research to deepen its understanding of students with special
needs. The aim of this theoretical paper is to provide an overview of the didactical aspects in the field
of autism and mathematics education. First we review literature on autism spectrum disorders (ASD)
from a broad psychological perspective, and second, we focus on three cognitive theories which are
used to explain the behavioral symptoms of ASD. Next, we discuss mathematics specific didactical
issues that relate to these cognitive theories. Finally, we elaborate on an example of research on
mathematics education for ASD students based on the Van Hiele model of thinking in geometry. In
the conclusions we bring together the findings and give suggestions for future research.
Keywords: Autism Spectrum Disorder, mathematics, geometry, Van Hiele, secondary education,
didactics, inclusion.

Introduction
Autism is a neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by impairments in social interaction and
communication, and by restricted and repetitive patterns of behavior (American Psychiatric
Association, 2013). Different combinations of the impairments occur, and together form a continuum,
which is called the autism spectrum of disorders (ASD; Wing, 1988). Both the severity of the
symptoms and the intellectual capacities of people with ASD vary widely. There is a growing
understanding that people with autism can also provide a substantial contribution to society (e.g.
Mottron, 2011). In most countries, and also in the Netherlands, inclusion policies require schools to
develop support for children with autism. In this article we will focus on ASD students with higher
intellectual abilities1 and who require limited support, and hence can participate in inclusive
secondary education.
Mathematics is a school-subject that builds on logic, is well structured, uses symbolic language with
well-defined meanings and deals, at least in its purer forms, with unambiguous questions. These
characteristics make mathematics a subject that is relatively easy to access for people with ASD.
Research shows that autism is found more often amongst mathematics students than those of other
disciplines (e.g. Baron-Cohen, Wheelwright, Burtenshaw, & Hobson, 2007). However, other studies
showed that the majority of ASD students and higher intelligence have an average mathematical
ability compared to the normal population, while only some have mathematical giftedness (e.g.
Chiang & Lin, 2007).
In secondary schools that include ASD students, teaching mathematics is not an easy task. Based on
research and our own experiences of teaching in inclusive schools, we claim that ASD students
learning mathematics require specific subject-didactical support. A review of research on autism

1
In literature on autism this also indicated as High Functioning Autism and Asperger Syndrome or HFA/AS (Whitby &
Mancil, 2009).

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showed that most studies are about medical or behavioral aspects, and less than 20% targets education
(Graff, Berkeley, Evmenova, & Park, 2014). Research on autism in inclusive education is mainly
about pedagogic topics concerning the ASD students (Ravet, 2011). However, there is little research
on didactical aspects of autism in specific subject fields.
The aim of this theoretical paper is to provide an overview of the didactical aspects in the field of
autism and mathematics education. Our research question is the following:
Which didactical issues are related to ASD students learning mathematics?

Literature review
Autism spectrum disorders
After the first case studies by Kanner in 1943, and Asperger in 1944, it took until the end of the
1970’s, when Wing and Gould (1979) provided their classic description of the triad of impairments
of autism: first, the absence or impairment of social interaction, especially with peers; secondly, the
absence or impairment of the development of verbal and nonverbal language; and third, repetitive,
stereotyped activities of any kind. Confusion about different subtypes lead Wing (1988) to the
conclusion that there must be an autistic continuum, which she coined the Autism Spectrum of
Disorders (ASD) with diagnoses such as classic autism, PDD-NOS (Pervasive Developmental
Disorder – Not Otherwise Specified) and Asperger’s syndrome. With the latest version of the
diagnostic manual DSM-5 (American Psychiatric Association, 2013) the diagnosis of ASD is based
on persistent deficits in social communication and social interaction, and on restricted, repetitive
patterns of behavior, interests or activities. The subtypes of PDD-NOS and Asperger are no longer
official diagnoses, and DSM-5 describes three levels of severity for ASD (i.e. requiring very
substantial support; requiring substantial support; and requiring support).
The psychological research into autism has been dominated by three cognitive theories (Rajendran &
Mitchell, 2007): the Theory of Mind deficit; Executive Dysfunction; and the Weak Central Coherence
accounts.
The Theory of Mind deficit
Children with ASD experience their social environment as unpredictable and incomprehensible
(Baron-Cohen, Leslie, & Frith, 1985). They seem to treat people and things the same way.
Observations showed, strikingly, that children with Down syndrome and a low intelligence developed
a normal social competence, whilst children with ASD and higher intelligence did not (Baron-Cohen
et al., 1985). To explain this, Baron-Cohen, et al. did research on the Theory of Mind: neurotypical
children (non-ASD) are able to impute mental states to themselves and others (in other words, they
have a “theory of mind”), whilst children with ASD fail to do so. This “mind-blindness” was shown
by the false belief test: a story, played out for the child with dolls, where one doll has a belief about
the location of an object that is incongruous with its real location. The test subject is then asked where
the doll will look for the object. To answer correctly the test subject should infer the mental state of
the doll (“I think she thinks”). A large proportion (80%) of children with ASD incorrectly assumed
the doll would look on the real location. To explain the 20% of children with ASD who answered
correctly, second-order false belief tests (“I think she thinks he thinks”) were developed, and based
on those results, it was assumed that a Theory of Mind is not always lacking completely but may be

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not fully developed in children with ASD. Another problem was that Theory of Mind can be used to
explain impairments in play, social interaction and verbal and nonverbal communication, but not for
explaining the other characteristics of ASD, such as the restricted interests, obsessive desire to keep
things unchanged (rigidity and inflexibility), and so on (Frith & Happé, 1994).
Executive dysfunction
Early in the 1990’s, Ozonoff, Pennington and Rogers (1991) suggested that deficits in the executive
functions could explain symptoms of autism such as narrow interests, rigidity and inflexibility.
Executive function is defined as the ability to maintain an appropriate problem-solving set for
attainment of a future goal; it includes behaviors such as planning, impulse control, inhibition of
pre-potent but irrelevant responses, set maintenance, organized search, and flexibility of thought
and action (Ozonoff et al., 1991, p. 1083).
The research by Ozonoff et al. (1991) showed that deficits with executive function where found in
both children with classic high-functioning autism and those with Asperger’s syndrome (who
succeeded on the second-order false belief test). This suggested that deficits in executive function
form a primary cognitive deficit in ASD.
Weak Central Coherence
In neurotypical children (non-ASD) the development of information processing is oriented towards
extracting the overall meaning from the sensory input. This inclination is called ‘central coherence’.
Frith (1989) described how this development is different in children with ASD, and she proposed the
weak central coherence theory to explain the symptoms of autism. Psychological tests later showed
that children with ASD have superior performance on local information processing, but were less
inclined to global information processing (Happé, 1999). In people with ASD this is also observed as
a preoccupation with details and parts and a failure to understand the meaning of the whole.

Implications of ASD for mathematics education

Although the focus of this paper is on mathematics education, we first address some approaches for
ASD students that apply to education in general.
General education
A general pedagogic approach for students with ASD is structured teaching (Mesibov & Shea, 2010).
Structure can be provided in the physical environment (e.g. arrangement of the room and the use of
visual clues), the sequence of events during the day (e.g. an understandable schedule), the individual
tasks (e.g. provide specific information of the goals and the completion criteria) and the grouping of
tasks into a work system. Many of these approaches in autism have not been well researched, and
research is now addressing the determination of evidence-based practices (Reichow, Volkmar, &
Cicchetti, 2008).
Mathematics education
Based on a review of 18 studies of mathematical abilities of ASD students with AS/HFA, Chiang and
Lin (2007) found that the majority of the ASD students have average mathematical capabilities and
only some ASD students have a mathematical giftedness. Based on these results, Chiang and Lin

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concluded that an age-appropriate mathematical curriculum can be used, but individual adjustments
may be needed to support both relative strengths and weaknesses.
In a review of the literature on academic achievement profiles of ASD students, Whitby and Mancil
(2009) report that more than half (52%) of individuals diagnosed with ASD have IQs above 70 and
for these children, academic goals come within reach. There is a need for appropriate interventions
to allow these children to perform up to their potential and obtain meaningful employment. For
mathematical abilities, Whitby and Mancil found that computational skills were intact, but applied
mathematics capabilities were impaired. Issues with the application of mathematics are possibly due
to executive functioning deficits with their organizational and attentional skills that have a negative
effect on multi-step problem solving. Deficits in comprehension (both listening and reading) relate to
contextual understanding (e.g. word problems) and conceptual understanding (e.g. abstract concepts).
With word problems, ASD students have difficulty choosing the right approach because they have,
due to their weak central coherence, difficulty seeing the similarities and the common structure of
different examples and exercises. An ASD adjusted didactical approach for solving word problems
should address improving reading comprehension, mathematics vocabulary, computation, and
everyday mathematical knowledge (Bae, Chiang, & Hickson, 2015, p. 2206).
In solving mathematical problems (“a question that exercises the mind”; Schoenfeld, 1985) ASD
students are impaired by executive dysfunction (Ozonoff et al., 1991). In mathematical problem
solving ASD students have similar issues as with word problems, but are also expected to face issues
with cognitive flexibility, the use of heuristics and the use of meta-cognitive strategies. Positive
results have been reported on the effects of cognitive strategy instructions for students with learning
disabilities (Montague, Krawec, Enders, & Dietz, 2014), and these results may also be obtainable for
ASD students. In classroom practice we see that some ASD students develop problem solving
procedures of their own, which may work on the initial (simple) problems but cannot be generalized
to later extensions. Upon receiving feedback, the rigidity of these ASD students sometimes inhibits
them from accepting the time-proven approaches. Feedback is also known to play an important role
in self-regulated learning (Butler & Winne, 1995). Improving feedback seeking strategies of ASD
students, can support their self-regulated learning, and help to overcome barriers in problem solving.
Conceptual understanding can be a challenge for ASD students: they have, due to their weak central
coherence, difficulty integrating information and generalizing previously learned concepts (Klinger
& Dawson, 2001). Minshew and Goldstein (2002) found that individuals with high-functioning
autism had impaired concept formation. Furthermore, these individuals had difficulty with cognitive
flexibility and showed incomplete understanding of learned concepts. Temple Grandin, diagnosed
with ASD, describes (2006) how she memorizes as much facts and experiences as possible, and uses
an internal search engine to retrieve visual images of prototypes to understand a concept. In general,
ASD-students benefit from visualization of abstract concepts, and with their strong root memory,
they remember the visualizations as prototypes of the concept.

An example: A research study on learning geometry by ASD students

To illustrate research on subject-specific didactic problems for ASD students, we describe an example
from geometry and the cognitive theory of weak central coherence. This example is based on a master
thesis of the first author (Klaren, 2012). The theoretical/ analytical framework is concerned with Van

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Hiele’s theory, which defines five levels of the learning process that learners are said go through
when learning geometry. The five levels are described by Hoffer (1981) as:
- Level 1, Recognition: the student
learns some vocabulary and
recognizes the shape as a whole;
- Level 2, Analysis: the student
analyzes properties of the figures;
- Level 3, Ordering: the student
logically orders figures and
understands interrelationships
between figures and the importance
of accurate definitions;
Figure 1: Example of question on level 1 (recognition)
- Level 4, Deduction: the student
understands the significance of deduction and the role of postulates, theorems, and proof;
- Level 5, Rigor: the student understands the importance of precision in dealing with foundations and
interrelationships between structures
Van Hiele posited that learners master the levels in a stepwise manner and always in the same
sequence. In other words: the difficulty of questions specific to the successive levels, will rise. Usiskin
(1982) confirmed the ability of the Van Hiele theory to describe and predict the performance of
students in secondary education on geometry. The fifth level was not well operationalized by Van
Hiele, and left out of further analyses.
Students with weak central coherence (operationalized as students with ASD), are hypothesized to
have an inversion of the difficulty of level 1 and 2. In other words: they are expected to find questions
at level 1 (“shape as a whole”; see Figure 1) more difficult than questions at level 2 (analyses of
properties).
To test the hypothesis, 81 children with ASD and higher intellectual abilities, age 12 to 17 years, were
tested with the geometry test of Usiskin (with the texts translated in Dutch and the original diagrams).
Rasch analyses was used to estimate the average difficulty (on a logit scale) of questions at each level.
The results were compared with results found for non-ASD students by Wilson (1990) in a reanalysis
of the data of Usiskin. The combined results (Figure 2) show that the estimated average item-
difficulty of questions on level 1 and 2
were indeed shifted for ASD students
(level 1 more difficult and level 2
easier) compared to non-ASD students.
However, level 1 was not found to be
more difficult than level 2 for ASD
students. Based on these findings, the
(strong) hypothesis of inversion must
be rejected, but the test gives some
support for the anticipated differences
between ASD and non-ASD students Figure 2: Average item-difficulty per level

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regarding the difficulty of the first two levels of Van Hiele. In the didactical practice of geometry
teaching, this should raise awareness that visual recognition by ASD students is to be linked to explicit
analyses of properties in order to support concept formation.
A peculiar observation was that some students who performed well on questions on higher levels,
made unexpected errors in questions on level 1: on questions where the squares were to be pointed
out (e.g. Figure 1), they included the rectangles. A possible explanation of this type of errors is the
ambiguity of the mathematical language: in Dutch the translation of square is “vierkant” (literal
translation: “four sides”). In interviews after the test, students explained their answers by stating that
the rectangles had four sides. Possibly these students where not relying on the shape as a whole, but
applied rule-based logic in combination with literal understanding of the mathematical concept.

Conclusions
The three cognitive theories described in this paper represent theoretical frameworks that can guide
research in autism and mathematics education.
As described by the (lack of) Theory of Mind account, ASD students experience their social
environment as unpredictable and incomprehensible. Research on ASD and general educational will
address the development of evidence-based practices that support ASD students in their social
interactions. Research on mathematics education can develop interventions that aim for using
(understanding) and seeking feedback with respect to learning mathematical concepts and skills.
Related to feedback is the use of self-regulated learning. Students with ASD, with their typical weak
executive functioning, can be supported by interventions that improve their metacognition and use of
strategies and heuristics, especially in the field of mathematical problem solving.
Recent research on perception by people with autism (e.g. Pellicano & Burr, 2012; Hohwy, 2013) is
deepening the neurocognitive understanding of the weak central coherence account. Research on
mathematics education may benefit from these results, and improve the understanding of concept
learning by ASD students.
To summarize, students with ASD have deficits in their social interaction, their contextual and
conceptual understanding, and the self-regulation of their executive functioning. In order to allow
successful inclusion of ASD students in education, teachers have to apply effective instruction
methods to overcome the “mind-blindness” of these students. Research can help define design
guidelines for instructional methods in mathematics, which are attuned to the specific needs of ASD
students and allow them to see the beauty of mathematics.
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