Twice-Exceptional Students in Saudi Arabia: A review of the Research Literature from 1990 to 2018

The current study is a literature review which was conducted to analyze studies on twice-exceptionality published in English in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) between 1990 and 2018. Aim: To analyze the findings in the research conducted on twice-exceptionality in KSA. Methods and procedures: The following electronic databases were used to search the relevant literature: SAGE, ERIC, EBSCOhost Databases, SpringerLink, ScienceDirect, and the Dissertations, master’s theses Database. These databases were selected because these are where most of the literature on education is published. Moreover, the author used two studies that are in press because there are few studies on the topic and these studies will increase the amount of available data. The publications used in this study were retrieved and each was reviewed and analyzed. A table was created for each study with categories of author and year, sample, purpose, method, and key findings. The results showed that a total of eight studies related to twice-exceptional students in Saudi Arabia have been published in those years, and all of them were published in the last eight years. The main focus of the research in most of these studies relates to barriers to identifying twice-exceptional students. Conclusions and implications: The results of this study reveal that relatively little research has been conducted in Saudi Arabia on twice-exceptionality. More research is warranted to identify twice-exceptional students in Saudi schools. Further research is also needed to provide professional development and training in twice-exceptionality to Saudi teachers, in order to enable them to identify such students, which the studies indicate that they are currently unable to do.