Dataset Information

Comprehensive Social Trait Judgments From Faces in Autism Spectrum Disorder.

ABSTRACT: Processing social information from faces is difficult for individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). However, it remains unclear whether individuals with ASD make high-level social trait judgments from faces in the same way as neurotypical individuals. Here, we comprehensively addressed this question using naturalistic face images and representatively sampled traits. Despite similar underlying dimensional structures across traits, online adult participants with self-reported ASD showed different judgments and reduced specificity within each trait compared with neurotypical individuals. Deep neural networks revealed that these group differences were driven by specific types of faces and differential utilization of features within a face. Our results were replicated in well-characterized in-lab participants and partially generalized to more controlled face images (a preregistered study). By investigating social trait judgments in a broader population, including individuals with neurodevelopmental variations, we found important theoretical implications for the fundamental dimensions, variations, and potential behavioral consequences of social cognition.

SUBMITTER: Cao R

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10626626 | biostudies-literature | 2023 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Comprehensive Social Trait Judgments From Faces in Autism Spectrum Disorder.

Cao Runnan R Zhang Na N Yu Hongbo H Webster Paula J PJ Paul Lynn K LK Li Xin X Lin Chujun C Wang Shuo S

Psychological science 20230906 10

Processing social information from faces is difficult for individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). However, it remains unclear whether individuals with ASD make high-level social trait judgments from faces in the same way as neurotypical individuals. Here, we comprehensively addressed this question using naturalistic face images and representatively sampled traits. Despite similar underlying dimensional structures across traits, online adult participants with self-reported ASD showed dif ...[more]

PMID: 37671893

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Project description:Individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) have difficulties with social communication and interaction. The social motivation hypothesis states that a reduced interest in social stimuli may partly underlie these difficulties. Thus far, however, it has been challenging to quantify individual differences in social orientation and interest, and to pinpoint the neural underpinnings of it. In this study, we tested the neural sensitivity for social versus non-social information in 21 boys with ASD (8-12 years old) and 21 typically developing (TD) control boys, matched for age and IQ, while children were engaged in an orthogonal task. We recorded electroencephalography (EEG) during fast periodic visual stimulation (FPVS) of social versus non-social stimuli to obtain an objective implicit neural measure of relative social bias. Streams of variable images of faces and houses were superimposed, and each stream of stimuli was tagged with a particular presentation rate (i.e., 6 and 7.5 Hz or vice versa). This frequency-tagging method allows disentangling the respective neural responses evoked by the different streams of stimuli. Moreover, by using superimposed stimuli, we controlled for possible effects of preferential looking, spatial attention, and disengagement. Based on four trials of 60 s, we observed a significant three-way interaction. In the control group, the frequency-tagged neural responses to faces were larger than those to houses, especially in lateral occipito-temporal channels, while the responses to houses were larger over medial occipital channels. In the ASD group, however, faces and houses did not elicit significantly different neural responses in any of the regions. Given the short recording time of the frequency-tagging paradigm with multiple simultaneous inputs and the robustness of the individual responses, the method could be used as a sensitive marker of social preference in a wide range of populations, including younger and challenging populations.

Project description:Current literature is divided over whether and how processes such as perspective taking and reward sensitivity differ between individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) versus neurotypical individuals. Discounting tasks may provide novel insight into how these processes operate. In delay discounting tasks, participants choose between smaller immediate rewards and larger delayed rewards, and in social discounting tasks, participants choose between a smaller monetary rewards for themselves versus a larger reward for partners of varied social distance (e.g., a close friend vs. an acquaintance). Delay and social discounting tasks thus implicitly measure the subjective value of rewards given to one's future self and to others, capturing constructs such as perspective taking, reward processing, and social closeness, all of which have been discussed as core cognitive mechanisms underlying ASD. Despite extensive research on discounting in other clinical populations, few studies have examined delay discounting in ASD and no research has examined social discounting in ASD. The goal of the current study was to assess delay and social discounting for monetary rewards in a single sample of adolescents and adults with ASD compared to a matched neurotypical sample. Overall, adults and adolescents with ASD valued both future rewards and rewards given to others less than their typical counterparts did, but rates of discounting were not significantly correlated across temporal and social domains. These results extend an important behavioral paradigm for understanding both perspective taking and reward processing to autism. Autism Res 2019, 12: 870-877. © 2019 International Society for Autism Research, Wiley Periodicals, Inc. LAY SUMMARY: Discounting tasks-which experimentally measure the subjective value of different rewards-have been used with a variety of clinical populations, but are underexplored in ASD. We found that compared to neurotypical individuals, individuals with ASD showed diminished subjective value for future rewards (compared to immediate rewards) and rewards for others (compared to rewards for self). This finding has implications for understanding perspective taking, reward processing, and social closeness in ASD.

Dataset Information

Comprehensive Social Trait Judgments From Faces in Autism Spectrum Disorder.

Publications

Comprehensive Social Trait Judgments From Faces in Autism Spectrum Disorder.

Similar Datasets

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