Is everybody always my friend? Perception of approachability in Williams syndrome

Heterogeneity of social approach behaviour in Williams syndrome: The role of response inhibition

“…cluster three and four demonstrated very similar response inhibition scores and approachability ratings, yet substantially different emotion recognition scores. These findings support previous studies (Mobbs et al, 2006;Porter et al, 2007;Menghini et al, 2010) which have proposed that deficits in inhibition are a key executive characteristic for individuals with WS and that SAB in WS may be linked to an inhibitory deficit for social responses Frigerio et al, 2006;Porter et al, 2007).…”

“…The findings revealed a significant relationship between increased volumes and higher approachability ratings in WS to both 'negative' faces and 'positive' faces which supports this hypothesis. However, Frigerio et al (2006) and Porter, Coltheart & Langdon (2007) found that individuals with WS rated only the 'positive' faces as more approachable than controls whilst 'negative' faces were rated as less approachable. They concluded that individuals with WS are able to discriminate the approachability of individuals and their SAB was not a function of underlying emotion recognition difficulties.…”

“…Following observations that individuals with WS tended to look intensely at researchers during experimental procedures Mervis et al, 2003), Frigerio et al (2006) proposed that individuals with WS have high 'social stimulus attraction ' (p.258) and that this drives their SAB. Research using eye-tracking methodology has provided experimental evidence that individuals with WS tend to look at faces for extended periods (Riby & Hancock., 2008) in particular the eye region (Mervis et al, 2003;Riby & Hancock 2008) which further supports this hypothesis.…”

First impressions: Gait cues drive reliable trait judgements

“…Five of these were related to the Big Five: adventurousness (measuring openness to experience), extraversion, neuroticism, trustworthiness (measuring conscientiousness) and warmth (measuring agreeableness). To this a sixth scale, approachability, was added, because of its frequent use in the person perception literature (Adolphs, Tranel, & Damasio, 1998;Frigerio, et al, 2006;Montepare & Zebrowitz-McArthur, 1988). All 26 stimuli were rated on a given scale before the next scale appeared, creating a total of six blocks.…”

Do Faces Capture the Attention of Individuals with Williams Syndrome or Autism? Evidence from Tracking Eye Movements

“…Bellugi et al, 2000). Whilst individuals with autism are typically characterised by social withdrawal and a lack of desire to engage in social interactions (Frith, 1989;DSM IV, APA 1994), individuals with WS are associated with a drive towards social engagement, often labelled as 'hyper-sociability' or a 'pro-social compulsion' (Frigerio et al, 2006). They show a desire to interact with people whether they are familiar or unfamiliar to them (Doyle et al, 2004), as well as a propensity to hold prolonged face gaze during social interactions (Mervis et al, 2003) and interview conditions (Doherty-Sneddon, Riby, Calderwood, & Ainsworth, submitted).…”