Differences Between Autistic and Non-Autistic Adults in the Recognition of Anger from Facial Motion Remain after Controlling for Alexithymia

Keating, Connor Tom; Fraser, Dagmar S.; Sowden, Sophie; Cook, Jennifer

doi:10.1007/s10803-021-05083-9

Cited by 30 publications

(52 citation statements)

References 75 publications

(102 reference statements)

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“…Our recent findings therefore illustrate differences between autistic and non‐autistic adults in emotion recognition from facial kinematic information (Keating et al, 2021). However, these differences are specifically restricted to anger and do not extend to happiness and sadness (Keating et al, 2021). Interestingly, this anger‐specific difficulty is also mirrored in the static emotion recognition literature.…”

Section: Introductionsupporting

confidence: 69%

“…In order to redress the bias towards the use of static stimuli in the ASD emotion recognition literature, our most recent work employed the paradigm developed by Sowden and colleagues to investigate emotion recognition from facial motion cues in ASD (Keating et al, 2021). There were two key findings from our recent study.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…There were two key findings from our recent study. First, autistic adults (relative to non‐autistic adults who were matched on age, gender, non‐verbal reasoning [NVR] and alexithymia) had significantly lower emotion recognition accuracy for angry, but not happy or sad, facial motion when PLFs were unmanipulated (i.e., when they were played at their normal (100%) speed and with normal (100%) degree of spatial movement across frames; Keating et al, 2021). Second, whilst for controls, recognition accuracy increased when angry facial motion was sped up from 50% to 100% speed and from 100% to 150% speed, the recognition accuracy of autistic participants only increased from 100% to 150% (and not from 50% to 100%; Keating et al, 2021).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…First, autistic adults (relative to non‐autistic adults who were matched on age, gender, non‐verbal reasoning [NVR] and alexithymia) had significantly lower emotion recognition accuracy for angry, but not happy or sad, facial motion when PLFs were unmanipulated (i.e., when they were played at their normal (100%) speed and with normal (100%) degree of spatial movement across frames; Keating et al, 2021). Second, whilst for controls, recognition accuracy increased when angry facial motion was sped up from 50% to 100% speed and from 100% to 150% speed, the recognition accuracy of autistic participants only increased from 100% to 150% (and not from 50% to 100%; Keating et al, 2021). Note that since our groups were matched in terms of alexithymia (a subclinical condition, characterised by difficulties identifying and expressing emotions [Nemiah et al, 1976]) differences between our groups were related to autistic, not alexithymic, characteristics (for further discussion of this issue see Bird & Cook, 2013; Cook, Brewer, et al, 2013).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Comparing internal representations of facial expression kinematics between autistic and non‐autistic adults

2021

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Recent developments suggest that autistic individuals require dynamic angry expressions to have a higher speed in order for them to be successfully identified. Therefore, it is plausible that autistic individuals do not have a ‘deficit’ in angry expression recognition, but rather their internal representation of these expressions is characterised by very high‐speed movement. In this study, matched groups of autistic and non‐autistic adults completed a novel emotion‐based task which employed dynamic displays of happy, angry and sad point light facial (PLF) expressions. On each trial, participants moved a slider to manipulate the speed of a PLF stimulus until it moved at a speed that, in their ‘mind's eye’, was typical of happy, angry or sad expressions. Participants were shown three different types of PLFs—those showing the full‐face, only the eye region, and only the mouth region, wherein the latter two were included to test whether differences in facial information sampling underpinned any dissimilarities in speed attributions. Across both groups, participants attributed the highest speeds to angry, then happy, then sad, facial motion. Participants increased the speed of angry and happy expressions by 41% and 27% respectively and decreased the speed of sad expressions by 18%. This suggests that participants have ‘caricatured’ internal representations of emotion, wherein emotion‐related kinematic cues are over‐emphasised. There were no differences between autistic and non‐autistic individuals in the speeds attributed to full‐face and partial‐face angry, happy and sad expressions respectively. Consequently, we find no evidence that autistic adults possess atypically fast internal representations of anger.

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Section: Introductionsupporting

confidence: 69%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Comparing internal representations of facial expression kinematics between autistic and non‐autistic adults

2021

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“…Trials in which two expression categories received the same slider scores were discounted from the analysis (missing values). To check the robustness of this approach, we re-ran all analyses on accuracy with a relative accuracy score which was calculated by subtracting the mean score of all other expression categories from score of the correct expression category (Keating et al, 2021). The results are reported in the Supplemental Materials.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Facial mimicry and metacognitive judgments in emotion recognition – modulated by social anxiety and autistic traits?

Folz¹,

Akdağ²,

Nikolić³

et al. 2022

Preprint

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Both individuals with social anxiety disorder and individuals with autism spectrum disorder show alterations in the perception of others’ emotional facial expressions. Additionally, mimicry of an observed expression as well as the assessment of one’s own performance, i.e. metacognition, may be altered in these individuals. Using a non-clinical sample (N=57), we examined whether emotion recognition is linked to facial mimicry and confidence in one’s performance, as well as potential alterations in this link associated with social anxiety and autistic traits. While participants were presented with videos of spontaneous emotional facial expressions, we measured their facial muscle activity, and asked them to label the expressions and indicate their confidence levels in accurately labelling the expressions. Our results showed that confidence in emotion recognition was lower with higher social anxiety trait levels even though actual recognition was not related to social anxiety trait levels. Higher autistic trait levels, in contrast, were associated with worse recognition as well as a weakened link between performance and facial mimicry. Consequently, social anxiety might not affect emotion recognition itself but the top-down evaluation in an emotion recognition context, whereas individuals with autism may integrate information promoting emotion recognition, i.e. sensorimotor simulations, to a lesser degree.

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Speed and accuracy of emotion recognition in autistic adults: The role of stimulus type, response format, and emotion

et al. 2022

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Emotion recognition difficulties are considered to contribute to social‐communicative problems for autistic individuals. Prior research has been dominated by a focus on forced‐choice recognition response accuracy for static face presentations of basic emotions, often involving small samples. Using free‐report and multiple‐choice response formats, we compared emotion recognition in IQ‐matched autistic (N = 63) and nonautistic (N = 67) adult samples using 12 face emotion stimuli presented in three different stimulus formats (static, dynamic, social) that varied the degree of accompanying contextual information. Percent agreement with normative recognition responses (usually labeled “recognition accuracy”) was slightly lower for autistic adults. Both groups displayed marked inter‐individual variability and, although there was considerable overlap between groups, a very small subset of autistic individuals recorded lower percent agreement than any of the nonautistic sample. Overall, autistic individuals were significantly slower to respond and less confident. Although stimulus type, response format, and emotion affected percent agreement, latency and confidence, their interactions with group were nonsignificant and the associated effect sizes extremely small. The findings challenge notions that autistic adults have core deficits in emotion recognition and are more likely than nonautistic adults to be overwhelmed by increasingly dynamic or complex emotion stimuli and to experience difficulties recognizing specific emotions. Suggested research priorities include clarifying whether longer recognition latencies reflect fundamental processing limitations or adjustable strategic influences, probing age‐related changes in emotion recognition across adulthood, and identifying the links between difficulties highlighted by traditional emotion recognition paradigms and real‐world social functioning. Lay Summary It is generally considered that autistic individuals are less accurate than nonautistic individuals at recognizing other people's facial emotions. Using a wide array of emotions presented in various contexts, this study suggests that autistic individuals are, on average, only slightly less accurate but at the same time somewhat slower when classifying others' emotions. However, there was considerable overlap between the two groups, and great variability between individuals. The differences between groups prevailed regardless of how stimuli were presented, the response required or the particular emotion.

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Differences Between Autistic and Non-Autistic Adults in the Recognition of Anger from Facial Motion Remain after Controlling for Alexithymia

Cited by 30 publications

References 75 publications

Comparing internal representations of facial expression kinematics between autistic and non‐autistic adults

Comparing internal representations of facial expression kinematics between autistic and non‐autistic adults

Facial mimicry and metacognitive judgments in emotion recognition – modulated by social anxiety and autistic traits?

Speed and accuracy of emotion recognition in autistic adults: The role of stimulus type, response format, and emotion

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