Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and insertion into the job market: a systematic review

Abstract

Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by deficits in communication and social interaction. The objective was to carry out a systematic review based on the analysis of national and international publications, present in the scientific literature regarding young adults with ASD who are looking for a job and those who are already involved, in order to define and understand the difficulties, potentialities and how they can contribute to the work environment. A search for evidence was carried out in the Portal Regional VHL, PubMed, Scopus, Web Of Science and Embase databases. Cross-sectional and longitudinal studies were included, resulting in 6,385 studies. 2,766 duplicate articles and those that deviated from the proposed theme were excluded, leaving 168 articles. The abstracts were analyzed, eliminating those that presented inconsistent results. A final number of twelve works was obtained, all of which responded to the theme and with power in their methodological structure. Among the results, controversies were observed in the studies. The difficulties in understanding and adapting that ASD people experience in their daily lives have been a barrier to entering and remaining in the work environment, however, others saw the disorder as a strong point due to the high degree of visual perception. Therefore, despite the difficulties of ASD, it suggests that the social context and employers themselves should consider how they can support employees with the disorder to use their strengths. Strategies provided to this audience can help them recognize the immense value they can bring to the site.