A Critical Review of Five Books on Twice-exceptionality

Abstract

Twice-exceptional students have been misidentified as either special needs students or gifted students over the years, negatively impacting school performance and causing high rates of dropouts. The masking effects that special education needs, disabilities, and high learning potential have on each other cause the oversight of giftedness and places students in special needs programs that diminish motivation and self-efficacy. Conversely, solely identifying giftedness as the main curricular score that holds a student’s grades together severely impacts mental health and achievement outcomes. The purpose of the project is to evaluate available research for the identification and intervention methods for twice-exceptional students that harness and allow growth of giftedness and accommodate for special education needs. The project identified current evidence-based assessment tools for the identification of twice-exceptionality as well as intervention methods in the field and the need for further research. The criteria used for book review selection included an introduction, a background on previous studies conducted, methods of critique, and conclusions. The book reviews adopted the Frontiers in Psychology journal guideline; including a summary, discussion, and evaluation. The selected books covered extensive research studies that were compiled and edited over the past five years (2017-2021) under themes related to twice- exceptionality, mental illness in twice-exceptional students, and policy and assessment methods. This review aims to (a) evaluate the research findings concerned with the effectiveness of presented assessment methods and interventions for 2e students (b) identify the processes that hinder and invalidate research outcomes, and (c) identify and discuss the research gap present in the current literature and propose future investigation regarding diagnostic criteria. The review includes five books, edited by well-accredited professionals in the field of educational psychology over the last few years (2016-2021): “Twice Exceptional: Supporting and educating bright and creative students with learning difficulties”; “Talent development in gifted education: Theory, research, and practice”; “The school handbook for dual and multiple exceptionality”; and “To be gifted and learning disabled”; “Understanding twice-exceptional learners”. The books were selected from multiple search engines and databases (e.g., Google Scholar, Scopus, and ERIC) using specific keywords, such as gifted with learning disabilities, talented with learning disabilities, gifted with disabilities, gifted with a physical disability, gifted with autism, gifted sensory, gifted with ADHD, twice-exceptional, dual-exceptional, multiple exceptionalities. The review follows the guidelines set by Frontiers in Psychology journal. The book reviews showed the effectiveness of strength-based interventions, which include the collaboration between specialists, schoolteachers, and parents. The reviews also revealed multiple discrepancies in the identification of 2e students at school. Internal validity, however, needs to be enhanced regarding identification criteria. Hence, further research must be conducted to meet the internal validity of the instruments used.