Emotional Responsivity in Children with Autism, Children with Other Developmental Disabilities, and Children with Typical Development

Abstract

Twenty six children with autism, 24 children with developmental disabilities, and 15 typically developing children participated in tasks in which an adult displayed emotions. Child focus of attention, change in facial tone (i.e., hedonic tone), and latency to changes in tone were measured and summary scores of emotional contagion were created. Group differences existed in the ratio of episodes that resulted in emotional contagion. Correlations existed between measures of emotional contagion, measures of joint attention, and indices of severity of autism. Children with autism demonstrated muted changes in affect, but these responses occurred much less frequently than in comparison groups. The findings suggest directions for early identification and early treatment of autism.

Does Impaired Social Motivation Drive Imitation Deficits in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder?

“…Children with ASD performed worse on these tasks. Imitation deficits have been shown across a variety of tasks, including impaired performance on spontaneously imitating others' facial expressions (Scambler et al 2007), actions-on-object imitation tasks, and imitating motor movements (Rogers et al 2003). Additionally, a lack of imitative abilities has been shown to differentiate children with ASD from those with other developmental disorders as early as 2 years of age (Charman et al 1997) and is correlated with ASD severity scores (Rogers et al 2003).…”

Emotional Cognition: Theory of Mind and Face Recognition

“…At preschool age, children with IDASD show poorer emotional coordination and timing of affect during social exchanges, in comparison with children matched on their MA and their CA (Scambler, Hepburn, Rutherford, Wehner, & Rogers, 2007). At school age, they respond, with less concern and comforting behaviour or empathic behaviour, to others' emotional expressions; they do not easily share their affects or their emotional states with a partner (Bacon et al, 1998;Corona, Dissanayake, Arbelle, Wellington, & Sigman, 1998;Dawson et al, 2004;Kasari, Sigman, Mundy, & Yirmiya, 1990;Sigman et al, 1992).…”

What can autism teach us about the role of sensorimotor systems in higher cognition? New clues from studies on language, action semantics, and abstract emotional concept processing

“…Emotional expression in the face and voice is typically described as reduced or absent (Kanner, 1943;Moody, McIntosh, Mann, & Weisser, 2007;Scambler, Hepburn, Rutherford, Wehner, & Rogers, 2007;Yirmiya, Kasari, Sigman, & Mundy, 1989) or as markedly atypical and less recognisable (Asperger, 1944;Kanner, 1943;Langdell, 1981;Loveland, Tunali-Kotoski, Pearson, Brelsford, & et al, 1994;Mcdonald et al, 1989;McIntosh, Reichmann-Decker, Winkielman, & Wilbarger, 2006;Moody et al, 2007). This would make it particularly difficult for language-teachers to teach autistic children abstract emotional meaning in the means described above, and predicts a specific deficit in the processing of abstract emotion words comparable to that documented for (other) action words above.…”