Language Matters in British Newspapers: A Participatory Analysis of the Autism UK Press Corpus

This publication is included in the Autistic Autism Scholarship Project. two authors of this publication are identified as autistic in the project.

About the autistic author marker

Karaminis, T., Botha, M., Longley, S., Waldock, K. E., Storey, S., Strachan, K., Ransom, N., & Pellicano, E. (2024). Language Matters in British Newspapers: A Participatory Analysis of the Autism UK Press Corpus. Autism in Adulthood, 7(6), 698-711. https://doi.org/10.1089/aut.2023.0105

Publication date: 27 May 2024 Added to AutiHub: 5 Jul 2026 Type: Article Article language: English

This publication is integrated into AutiHub through:

Authors

Publication authors
8
Publication authors identified as autistic
2 / 8 (25.0%)

Abstract

Background: Language around autism plays a crucial role in shaping public attitudes toward autistic people. The use of identity-first versus person-first language and impersonal references to autism can affect how autistic people are perceived. These factors should impact the representation of autistic people in newspapers, where negative and stereotypical representations are often perpetuated. Method: We asked five autistic people to judge the sentiment toward autism and autistic people in 1000 quotes from British newspapers (2011-2020). The coders, who did not know the newspaper title and time of publication, made their judgments based on two dimensions, warmth and competence, from the Stereotype Content Model (SCM). We examined the overall judgments of warmth and competence and considered variations in language context and terminology, such as the use of impersonal references to autism or identity-first and person-first language. We also examined potential differences between broadsheets and tabloids, left- and right-leaning newspapers, and changes over time. Results: The majority of quotes from British newspapers fell under a low warmth and low competence area within SCM. Furthermore, impersonal references to autism tended to be rated lower in warmth and competence than references linking autism to an individual, whereas identity-first language was judged higher in warmth and competence than person-first language. Quotes from broadsheets were assigned similar warmth and slightly higher competence than quotes from tabloids. However, left-leaning and right-leaning papers did not differ regarding warmth and competence, and there were inconsistent changes over time. Conclusion: Our study confirms that the portrayal of autistic people in British newspapers tends to be negative. According to autistic raters, associating autism with a person and using identity-first language are linked to more positive representations. Although we found subtle variations in sentiment related to reporting style, our study shows little progress over time toward more positive portrayals.

Bibliography cited by this reference

Cited references are imported from external metadata sources when they are available. The list may be partial.

Cited bibliography overview

These indicators describe the bibliography cited by this publication. An author name is counted each time it appears in one cited reference, so the same person can be counted more than once. Names not yet linked to an author already present in AutiHub are treated as unknown, not as non-autistic. Last computed: 2 Oct 2026 07:50.

Cited references
84
With a DOI
68
Without a DOI, from raw bibliography text
16
21 / 84 (25.0%) cited references include at least one author identified as autistic.
References with data to complete
7 / 84 (8.3%)
References with detected author names
77 / 84 (91.7%)
Without detected author names
7
Without a structured title
5
Without a stable identifier
12
References with raw author names still to review
4
References with external metadata lookup issues
2
These indicators apply to cited references displayed on this page, after technical duplicates have been merged. A reference without a DOI can still support author statistics when a title and author names are available.
Author names detected in the cited bibliography
329
From DOI or external metadata
329
From validated raw bibliography text
0
Raw names already validated
0
Raw names still to review
4
188 / 329 (57.1%) names are linked to an author already present in AutiHub. 141 / 329 (42.9%) names are not yet linked.
Names linked to a person identified as autistic
74 / 329 (22.5%)
Calculated across all author names detected in the cited bibliography. Among names linked to an author already present in AutiHub: 74 / 188 (39.4%). Distinct people identified as autistic: 63 / 282 (22.3%).
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