To date, studies have not established whether autistic and non-autistic individuals differ in emotion recognition from facial motion cues when matched in terms of alexithymia. Here, autistic and non-autistic adults (N = 60) matched on age, gender, non-verbal reasoning ability and alexithymia, completed an emotion recognition task, which employed dynamic point light displays of emotional facial expressions manipulated in terms of speed and spatial exaggeration. Autistic participants exhibited significantly lower accuracy for angry, but not happy or sad, facial motion with unmanipulated speed and spatial exaggeration. Autistic, and not alexithymic, traits were predictive of accuracy for angry facial motion with unmanipulated speed and spatial exaggeration. Alexithymic traits, in contrast, were predictive of the magnitude of both correct and incorrect emotion ratings.
Journal article
2022-04-01T00:00:00+00:00
52
1855 - 1871
16
Alexithymia, Autism spectrum disorder, Emotion recognition, Facial expression, Movement kinematics, Adult, Affective Symptoms, Anger, Autism Spectrum Disorder, Autistic Disorder, Emotions, Facial Expression, Facial Recognition, Humans