The AQ (Autism-Spectrum Quotient) is a self-administered instrument for measuring the degree to which an adult with normal intelligence has the traits associated with the autistic spectrum. The AQ was administered in Japan to test whether the UK results would generalize to a very different culture. Three groups of subjects, adults with AS or HFA (n = 57), adult controls (n = 194), and University students (n = 1050) were assessed. The adults with AS/HFA had a mean AQ score which was significantly higher than both the controls and the University students. Among the controls, males scored significantly higher than females. The similarity of results in both the general population and the clinical group across the two cultures was remarkable.
These results indicate that eye gaze attracted attention more effectively than the arrow in typically developed children, while children with autism shifted their attention equally in response to eye gaze and arrow direction, failing to show preferential sensitivity to the social cue. Difficulty in shifting controlled attention to the instructed side was also found in children with autism.
Baron-Cohen, Wheelwright, Skinner, Martin, and Clubley (2001) constructed brief, self-administered instruments named the Autism-Spectrum Quotient (AQ), for measuring the degree to which an adult with normal intelligence has the traits associated with the autistic spectrum. In this paper, we report on a Japanese version of this new instrument. Three groups of Japanese subjects were assessed. Group 1 (n = 57) consisted of adults with Asperger Syndrome (AS) or high-functioning autism (HFA). The other two groups were control groups. Subjects of Group 2 (n = 194) were normal adults and those of Group 3 (n = 1 050) were students selected from five Universities in Tokyo and Chiba. The adults with AS/HFA had a mean AQ score of 37.9 (SD = 5.31), which was significantly higher than the two control groups (Group 2: X = 18.5, SD = 6.21, and Group 3: X = 20.7, SD = 6.38). While eighty-eight percent of the adults with AS/HFA scored more than 33 points, only 3% of subjects in the two control groups indicated those points. Among the controls, males scored slightly but significantly higher than females. The reliability of the AQ in both test-retest and inter-rater measures were significantly high.
This study is the first to report the disturbance of contagious yawning in individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Twenty-four children with ASD as well as 25 age-matched typically developing (TD) children observed video clips of either yawning or control mouth movements. Yawning video clips elicited more yawns in TD children than in children with ASD, but the frequency of yawns did not differ between groups when they observed control video clips. Moreover, TD children yawned more during or after the yawn video clips than the control video clips, but the type of video clips did not affect the amount of yawning in children with ASD. Current results suggest that contagious yawning is impaired in ASD, which may relate to their impairment in empathy. It supports the claim that contagious yawning is based on the capacity for empathy.
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