Normal Physiological Emotions but Differences in Expression of Conscious Feelings in Children with High-Functioning Autism

Shalom, Dorit Ben; Mostofsky, Stewart H.; Hazlett, Richard L.; Goldberg, Melissa C.; Landa, Rebecca; Faran, Yifat; McLeod, Daniel R.; Hoehn‐Saric, Rudolf

doi:10.1007/s10803-006-0077-2

Cited by 172 publications

(124 citation statements)

References 11 publications

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“…The neurophysiological basis of this ability, often referred to as mentalizing, can be demonstrated in a network of regions, which shows reduced activation in this group (see Frith & Frith, 2006, for a review). However, much less is known of how these high-functioning individuals experience their own bodily and emotional states, although a number of studies suggest that this experience is abnormal, with impaired emotional awareness being frequently reported (Ben Shalom et al, 2006;Hill, Berthoz, & Frith, 2004;Hurlburt, Happé, & Frith, 1994;Rieffe, Meerum Terwogt, & Kotronopoulou, 2006). This study aimed to increase this knowledge by investigating emotional awareness in HFA/AS.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 97%

Levels of emotional awareness and autism: An fMRI study

Silani

Bird

Brindley

et al. 2008

Social Neuroscience

404

317

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Autism is associated with an inability to identify and distinguish one's own feelings. We assessed this inability using alexithymia and empathy questionnaires, and used fMRI to investigate brain activity while introspecting on emotion. Individuals with high functioning autism/Asperger syndrome (HFA/AS) were compared with matched controls. Participants rated stimuli from the International Affective Picture System twice, once according to the degree of un/pleasantness that the pictures induced, and once according to their color balance. The groups differed significantly on both alexithymia and empathy questionnaires. Alexithymia and lack of empathy were correlated, indicating a link between understanding one's own and others' emotions. For both groups a strong relationship between questionnaire scores and brain activity was found in the anterior insula (AI), when participants were required to assess their feelings to unpleasant pictures. Regardless of selfreported degree of emotional awareness, individuals with HFA/AS differed from controls when required to introspect on their feelings by showing reduced activation in self-reflection/mentalizing regions. Thus, we conclude that difficulties in emotional awareness are related to hypoactivity in AI in both individuals with HFA/AS and controls, and that the particular difficulties in emotional awareness in individuals with HFA/AS are not related to their impairments in selfreflection/mentalizing.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 97%

Levels of emotional awareness and autism: An fMRI study

Silani

Bird

Brindley

et al. 2008

Social Neuroscience

404

317

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Not only do they exhibit more negative and less positive emotions in Contents lists available at ScienceDirect journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/psychresns comparison to TD controls (e.g., Ben Shalom et al, 2006;Capps et al, 1993;Kasari and Sigman, 1997;Samson et al, 2012Samson et al, , 2014, they also experience more frequent symptoms of anxiety and depression, are more irritable, have more frequent meltdowns or tantrums, are more aggressive, and show increased self-injurious behavior (Dominick et al, 2007;Gotham et al, 2013;Mazefsky et al, 2013;Quek et al, 2012;Vasa et al, 2013;White et al, 2009).…”

Section: Socio-affective Deficits In Autism Spectrum Disordermentioning

confidence: 99%

White matter structure in the uncinate fasciculus: Implications for socio-affective deficits in Autism Spectrum Disorder

Samson

Dougherty

Lee

et al. 2016

Psychiatry Research: Neuroimaging

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a b s t r a c tIndividuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) have social and communication deficits and difficulties regulating emotions. The brain bases of these socio-affective deficits are not yet clear, but one candidate is structural connectivity in the left uncinate fasciculus, which connects limbic temporal and frontal areas thought to be involved in socio-affective processing. In this study, we assessed white matter structure in the left and right uncinate fasciculus in 18 high-functioning individuals with ASD and 18 group-matched typically developing (TD) controls using Diffusion Tensor Imaging. To test specificity of the associations, we also examined the association between both uncinate fasciculi and restricted and repetitive behaviors. Compared to TD individuals, individuals with ASD had significantly lower fractional anisotropy (FA) in the left and right uncinate. Group status significantly moderated the association between left uncinate and socio-affective deficits, indicating that within the ASD group, FA was associated with socio-affective deficits: Individuals with ASD with lower FA in the left uncinate had significantly more social and emotion regulation deficits. There was no association with restricted and repetitive behaviors. This study provides evidence that the left uncinate may play a critical role in socio-affective skills in individuals with ASD.

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“…There was a tendency to misplace stress in the HFA group, in line with previous findings. The HFA group also had difficulty with the understanding and expression of utterances differentiated by affect: this was predictable, given the low ability of people with ASC to infer the feelings of others and to express their own feelings (as indicated in, for example, Ben Shalom et al, 2006;Capps, Yirmiya, & Sigman, 1992). The HFA group also performed significantly worse on imitation tasks, where they had to listen to a short phrase and repeat it with matching prosody.…”

Section: Previous Researchmentioning

confidence: 99%

Expressive prosody in children with autism spectrum conditions

Peppé

Cleland

Gibbon

et al. 2011

Journal of Neurolinguistics

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a b s t r a c tThe expressive prosodic abilities of two groups of school-age children with autism spectrum conditions (ASC), Asperger's syndrome (AS) and high-functioning autism (HFA), were compared with those of typically-developing controls. The HFA group showed impairment relative to age-matched controls on all the prosody tasks assessed (affect, sentence-type, contrastive stress, phrasing and imitation) while the AS showed impairment only on phrasing and imitation. Compared with lexically-matched controls, impairment on several tasks (affect, contrastive stress and imitation) was found in the HFA group but little in the AS group (phrasing and imitation). Comparisons between the ASC groups showed considerable differences on prosody skills. Impairment in prosodic skills may therefore be a reliable indicator of autism spectrum subgroups, at least as far as communicative functioning is concerned. There were also significant differences between ASC groups and lexically-matched typically-developing children on expressive language skills, but the incomplete correlation of the prosody results with scores on language tasks suggests that the prosodic differences between the two groups may not all be attributable to the level of language skills. Suggested further research is to investigate the relationship of prosody and language skills in this population more closely, and to develop a prosody test as part of the diagnostic criteria of ASC.

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Normal Physiological Emotions but Differences in Expression of Conscious Feelings in Children with High-Functioning Autism

Cited by 172 publications

References 11 publications

Levels of emotional awareness and autism: An fMRI study

Levels of emotional awareness and autism: An fMRI study

White matter structure in the uncinate fasciculus: Implications for socio-affective deficits in Autism Spectrum Disorder

Expressive prosody in children with autism spectrum conditions

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