Despite the fact that children with disabilities generally have been shown to be at a greater risk of bullying, which include physical attacks and threats, being picked on and teased and verbal abuse, there is still a need to understand bullying of children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and the strategies used by parents to support them in tackling this issue. This study aims to investigate the type and level of occurrence of bullying and parental support for children aged five with ASD who suffer from bullying. This study used both quantitative and qualitative analysis; a questionnaire, distributed to mothers of children with ASD, adopted from the Bullying for ASD Survey developed by Chen and Schwartz (Focus Autism Other Dev Disabil 27(4):200–212, 2012) measured types and frequency of bullying and parental support. An open-ended question was added to the survey to enable parents to write about the ways in which their child was bullied and the ways in which they supported their child. The results showed that while children suffered from all types of bullying, especially being picked on, being excluded and called names. Parental support showed a higher prevalence of involving peers and teachers for the prevention of bullying as well as avoiding strategies which included avoiding bullies and none of the mothers encouraged their children to stand up to bullies.

Whilst there has been a growing interest in children’s welfare in recent years, there has been a lack of consideration for those with special needs or health conditions such as autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Both children with ASD and neurotypical children may be affected by low self-esteem, poor physical condition, or psychological distress at school, which can affect their quality of life. It is therefore important for children and young people to have their quality of life measured and understood. While, for the Arab world, including Saudi Arabia, there has been the translation of health-related quality of life tools, there is a need to ensure their validity compared to the original English language versions. In light of this need, this paper presents the development and application of the KIDSCREEN-52 method to measure the quality of life for children with ASD and neurotypical children in schools in Saudi Arabia. A quantitative approach was employed to achieve the development of the method consisting of instrument translation and the standardized assessment of the quality of life for Saudi pupils. This developed method was found to independently and analytically assess the quality of life in Saudi pupils. The results from the application of the developed instrument revealed that although children without ASD rated their quality of life higher than those with ASD, overall, most Saudi Arabian students with ASD enjoy a reasonable quality of life. The findings of this study should be of interest to educators and individuals working with and on behalf of school-aged children and young people in foreign language settings where the application of development instruments could reveal the health-related quality of life.

Children with the autistic spectral disorder (ASD) have difficulty processing sensory inputs, especially auditory inputs. There have been a number of technological solutions that have developed based on different approaches in the form of hearing devices, however, limitations include the inability to successfully allow, through whitelisting, important sounds such as fire alarms and the sounds of cars and car horns. This paper proposes a hearing device supported by an application as a solution for children with ASD, the device is based on blacklisting and whitelisting features that allow for a reduction in auditory input through a selective process and contributes to selectivity through whitelisting for safety purposes. The proposed device will reduce distraction associated with hyper-responsiveness to certain auditory inputs, such as those from teachers or working group members, and increase concentration in the child by having fewer distractions.