Invisible disabilities and college academic success: New evidence from a mediation analysis

Students with “invisible” disabilities—including autism spectrum disorder (ASD), attention deficit disorder (ADD/ADHD), learning disorders, and mental health conditions—make up an increasingly large share of college students in the United States. Despite these gains in access, students with invisible disabilities remain disadvantaged relative to their neurotypical and non-disabled peers in many parts of the college experience, including academically. Researchers have hypothesized that inequalities in pre-college academic preparation, barriers to social integration, and lower levels of engagement on college campuses may be at least partially to blame. We test this hypothesis using newly available survey data on college students in the state of Indiana (n = 2728). Based on a series of decompositions, we show that students with invisible disabilities face a series of interrelated challenges, beginning with their academic preparation and extending into their social and academic experiences on college campuses. That these disadvantages feed into one another suggests the presence of a cumulative advantage/disadvantage process, in which early advantages and disadvantages compound as disabled and non-disabled students move through the educational system.