Cross-cultural variation in experiences of acceptance, camouflaging and mental health difficulties in autism: A registered report.

Recent findings suggest that stigma and camouflaging contribute to mental health difficulties for autistic individuals, however, this evidence is largely based on UK samples. While studies have shown cross-cultural differences in levels of autism-related stigma, it is unclear whether camouflaging and mental health difficulties vary across cultures. Hence, the current study had two aims: (1) to determine whether significant relationships between autism acceptance, camouflaging, and mental health difficulties replicate in a cross-cultural sample of autistic adults, and (2) to compare these variables across cultures. To fulfil these aims, 306 autistic adults from eight countries (Australia, Belgium, Canada, Japan, New Zealand, South Africa, the United Kingdom, and the United States) completed a series of online questionnaires. We found that external acceptance and personal acceptance were associated with lower levels of depression but not camouflaging or stress. Higher camouflaging was associated with elevated levels of depression, anxiety, and stress. Significant differences were found across countries in external acceptance, personal acceptance, depression, anxiety, and stress, even after controlling for relevant covariates. Levels of camouflaging also differed across countries however this effect became non-significant after controlling for the covariates. These findings have significant implications, identifying priority regions for anti-stigma interventions, and highlighting countries where greater support for mental health difficulties is needed.

Similar social attention, physiological arousal, and familiarity effect in autistic and neurotypical children: A real-life recreational eye-tracking paradigm.

Social attention is reported to be crucial for the development of social skills, and, according to the social cognitive developmental theory, is fostered by social interactions. Autism is of central importance to the study of social attention, as autism is characterized by atypical social interactions and low social attention, both linked according to the social motivation theory to diminished social interest. Much evidence for positing low social interest in autism comes from eye-tracking studies, which, however, lack ecological validity. Our study documents social attention and physiological arousal, within close to real-life settings, in autistic children, as well as in their neurotypical peers, matched on gender and mental or chronological age. To explore the potential influence of partner familiarity or of the conversational topic, children gaze and electrodermal activity were recorded while they engaged in watercolor activities with, first a familiar and, next, an unfamiliar adult experimenter, who both introduced various topics. Autistic and neurotypical children exhibited comparable attention to their partners' eyes. Notably, across all groups, heightened visual attention was directed to familiar rather than unfamiliar partners. Moreover, parallel arousal patterns emerged, with all children displaying increased skin conductance responses during more engaging topics and when looking at their interactional partner's eyes. These findings underscore the task- and context-dependent nature of social attention and highlight the role of familiarity in an ecologically valid context. The absence of group differences challenges the universality of the social cognitive developmental theory and questions the scope of the social motivation theory of autism. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Autism-Related Language Preferences of French-Speaking Autistic Adults: An Online Survey.

Background: In recent years, there have been increasing discussions surrounding the appropriate terminology to talk about autism. Initially, this debate revolved around the use of person-first language (e.g., person with autism) versus identity-first language (IFL; e.g., autistic person) but has recently expanded to other autism-related terms (e.g., deficits). However, to date, studies investigating autism-related language preferences have been limited to English-speaking countries, and little is known about preferences in other languages. This study addresses this gap by investigating the language preferences of French-speaking autistic adults. Methods: Five hundred and forty-one French-speaking autistic adults (formal diagnosis and self-identified) completed an online survey where they selected terms they preferred to use to talk about: (1) the nomenclature of autism; (2) an autistic person; (3) someone's autistic identity; (4) autism more broadly; (5) the abilities of autistic people; and (6) people without a diagnosis of autism. Participants also revealed more about their language preferences via an open-text response. Results: The most preferred terms were "Autisme," "Personne autiste," "Autiste," "Est Autiste," "Différence neurologique/cérébrale," "Différences," "Difficultés," "Personne neurotypique," "Neurotypique," and "Personne non-autiste." To better understand these preferences, participants' open comments were analyzed, revealing further support for IFL and the social model of disability, and a preference for simple, precise, and validated terms. Conclusions: These results are consistent with autism terminology preferences in English-speaking countries and provide additional insight into the reasons underlying these preferences. Such work has implications for informing the language of researchers, clinicians, and other professionals in the field, as well as the general public.

Community brief: Why is this an important issue?: More and more research is investigating which words should be used to talk about autism. Initially, this discussion revolved around the use of person-first language (e.g., person with autism) versus identity-first language (e.g., autistic person) but has recently expanded to other autism-related terms (e.g., disorder, deficits, high-functioning autism). To date, all the studies on this topic have focused on language preferences in English-speaking countries, and little is known about preferences in other languages.What was the purpose of this study?: We wanted to know whether French-speaking autistic adults would show similar or different autism-related language preferences than English-speaking autistic individuals. We also wanted to know the reasons for these language preferences.What did the researchers do?: In an online survey, we asked 541 French-speaking autistic adults around the world what terms they prefer to use to talk about (1) the nomenclature of autism, (2) an autistic person, (3) someone's autistic identity, (4) autism more broadly, (5) the abilities of autistic people, and (6) someone without an autism diagnosis. Participants also had the opportunity to tell us more about their language preferences in an open comment.What were the results of this study?: The most preferred terms were "Autisme," "Personne autiste," "Autiste," "Est Autiste," "Différence/neurologique," "Différences," "Difficultés," "Personne neurotypique," "Neurotypique," and "Personne non autiste." To better understand the reasons underlying these preferences, participants' open comments were analyzed, revealing further support for identity-first language and the social model of disability, and a preference for simple, precise, and validated terms. What do these findings add to what was already known?: We previously knew about language preferences of English-speaking autistic people. This study extends these findings by showing that French-speaking autistic adults also prefer terms that reflect the ideas of identity-first language (e.g., "Est Autiste," "Personne autiste") and the social model of disability (e.g., "Différence," "Handicap"). We also show that these are not the only reasons behind language preferences: Term simplicity, precision, and validity are also important when talking about autism.What are the potential weaknesses in the study?: The reported preferences are not representative of all autistic individuals, as our sample did not include children and adolescents. In addition, we did not make specific adaptations to our questionnaire for non-speaking people or people with intellectual difficulties, so we do not know to what extent their opinions are represented in our data. Further, recruitment was done almost exclusively online, resulting in a self-selecting recruitment method for our sample (i.e., participants who have access to Internet and a computer). Finally, participants who responded to the advertisements and completed the questionnaire are probably interested in the debate regarding language to talk about autism. Therefore, our sample may be more representative of the online autistic, pro-neurodiversity community.How will these findings help autistic adults now or in the future?: This study is the first to look at the language preferences of French-speaking autistic adults. Further, our results have substantial implications for informing the language of researchers, clinicians, and other professionals in the field, as well as the general public.

Listener- Versus Speaker-Oriented Disfluencies in Autistic Adults: Insights From Wearable Eye-Tracking and Skin Conductance Within a Live Face-to-Face Paradigm.

PURPOSE: Our study addresses three main questions: (a) Do autistics and neurotypicals produce different patterns of disfluencies, depending on the experimenter's direct versus averted gaze? (b) Are these patterns correlated to gender, skin conductance responses, fixations on the experimenter's face, alexithymia, or social anxiety scores? Lastly, (c) can eye-tracking and electrodermal activity data be used in distinguishing listener- versus speaker-oriented disfluencies? METHOD: Within a live face-to-face paradigm combining a wearable eye-tracker with electrodermal activity sensors, 80 adults (40 autistics, 40 neurotypicals) defined words in front of an experimenter who was either staring at their eyes (direct gaze condition) or looking elsewhere (averted gaze condition). RESULTS: Autistics produce less listener-oriented (uh, um) and more speaker-oriented (prolongations, breath) disfluencies than neurotypicals. In both groups, men produce less um than women. Both autistics' and neurotypicals' speech are influenced by whether their interlocutor systematically looks at them in the eyes or not, but their reactions go in opposite directions. Disfluencies seem to primarily be linguistic phenomena as experienced stress, social attention, alexithymia, and social anxiety scores do not influence any of the reported results. Finally, eye-tracking and electrodermal activity data suggest that laughter could be a listener-oriented disfluency. CONCLUSIONS: This article studies disfluencies in a fine-grained way in autistic and neurotypical adults while controlling for social attention, experienced stress, and experimental condition (direct vs. averted gaze). It adds to current literature by (a) enlightening our knowledge of speech in autism, (b) opening new perspectives on disfluency patterns as important signals in social interaction, (c) addressing theoretical issues on the dichotomy between listener- and speaker-oriented disfluencies, and (d) considering understudied phenomena as potential disfluencies (e.g., laughter, breath). SUPPLEMENTAL MATERIAL: https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.23549550.

Neurotypical, but not autistic, adults might experience distress when looking at someone avoiding eye contact: A live face-to-face paradigm.

LAY ABSTRACT: What is already known about the topic?Autistics are usually reported to share less eye contact than neurotypicals with their interlocutors. However, the reason why autistics might pay less attention to eyes looking at them is still unknown: some autistics express being hyper-aroused by this eye contact, while some eye-tracking studies suggest that eye contact is associated with hypo-arousal in autism.What this paper adds?This study is based on a highly controlled live face-to-face paradigm, combining a wearable eye-tracker (to study eye behaviours) with electrodermal activity sensors (to assess potential stress). We draw a nuanced picture of social attention in autism, as our autistic participants did not differ from our neurotypical group in their eye behaviours nor their skin conductance responses. However, we found that neurotypicals, compared to autistics, seemed to be much more distressed when their interlocutor did not gaze at them during the experiment.Implications for practice, research or policy:Our study encourages to consider social interaction difficulties in autism as a relational issue, instead as an individual deficit. This step might be first taken in research, by implementing paradigms sensitive to the experimenter's role and attitude.

Representing Polar Questions.

Although the linguistic properties of polar questions have been extensively studied, comparatively little is known about how polar questions are processed in real time. In this paper, we report on three eye-tracking experiments on the processing of positive and negative polar questions in English and French. Our results show that in the early stages, participants pay attention to both positive and negative states of affairs for both positive and negative questions. In the late stages, positive and certain negative polar questions were associated with a bias for the positive state, and this bias appears to be pragmatic in nature. We suggest that different biases in mental representations reflect the hearer's reasoning about the speaker's purposes of enquiry.

No preference for direct versus averted gaze in autistic adults: a reinforced preferential looking paradigm.

BACKGROUND: With the overarching objective to gain better insights into social attention in autistic adults, the present study addresses three outstanding issues about face processing in autism. First, do autistic adults display a preference for mouths over eyes; second, do they avoid direct gaze; third, is atypical visual exploration of faces in autism mediated by gender, social anxiety or alexithymia? METHODS: We used a novel reinforced preferential looking paradigm with a group of autistic adults (n = 43, 23 women) pairwise matched on age with neurotypical participants (n = 43, 21 women). Participants watched 28 different pairs of 5 s video recordings of a speaking person: the two videos, simultaneously displayed on the screen, were identical except that gaze was directed at the camera in one video and averted in the other. After a 680 ms transition phase, a short reinforcement animation appeared on the side that had displayed the direct gaze. RESULTS: None of the groups showed a preference for mouths over eyes. However, neurotypical participants fixated significantly more the stimuli with direct gaze, while no such preference emerged in autistic participants. As the experiment progressed, neurotypical participants also increasingly anticipated the appearance of the reinforcement, based on the location of the stimulus with the direct gaze, while no such anticipation emerged in autistic participants. LIMITATIONS: Our autistic participants scored higher on the social anxiety and alexithymia questionnaires than neurotypicals. Future studies should match neurotypical and autistic participants on social anxiety and alexithymia and complement questionnaires with physiological measures of anxiety. CONCLUSIONS: The absence of preference for direct versus averted gaze in the autistic group is probably due to difficulties in distinguishing eye gaze direction, potentially linked to a reduced spontaneous exploration or avoidance of the eye region. Social attention and preference for direct versus averted gaze correlated with alexithymia and social anxiety scores, but not gender.

[Pragmatics in autism spectrum disorder: recent developments]. / La pragmatique dans les troubles du spectre autistique - Développements récents.

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is characterized by primary pragmatic difficulties, out of step with verbal and non-verbal developmental level. This selective survey paper addresses three recent domains of research on pragmatic functions in autism. First, we provide an up-to-date discussion of how lack of sensitivity to social cues impacts early acquisition of words. Second, we review recent findings on the comprehension of non-literal language, pointing to a more refined clinical reality. Third, we describe recent developments in the study of conversation skills in autism.