Complex facial emotion recognition and atypical gaze patterns in autistic adults

While altered gaze behaviour during facial emotion recognition has been observed in autistic individuals, there remains marked inconsistency in findings, with the majority of previous research focused towards the processing of basic emotional expressions. There is a need to examine whether atypical...

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Main Authors: Black, Melissa, Chen, Nigel T.M., Lipp, Ottmar, Bolte, Sven, Girdler, Sonya
Format: Journal Article
Language:English
Published: SAGE PUBLICATIONS LTD 2020
Subjects:
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/79225
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author Black, Melissa
Chen, Nigel T.M.
Lipp, Ottmar
Bolte, Sven
Girdler, Sonya
author_facet Black, Melissa
Chen, Nigel T.M.
Lipp, Ottmar
Bolte, Sven
Girdler, Sonya
author_sort Black, Melissa
building Curtin Institutional Repository
collection Online Access
description While altered gaze behaviour during facial emotion recognition has been observed in autistic individuals, there remains marked inconsistency in findings, with the majority of previous research focused towards the processing of basic emotional expressions. There is a need to examine whether atypical gaze during facial emotion recognition extends to more complex emotional expressions, which are experienced as part of everyday social functioning. The eye gaze of 20 autistic and 20 IQ-matched neurotypical adults was examined during a facial emotion recognition task of complex, dynamic emotion displays. Autistic adults fixated longer on the mouth region when viewing complex emotions compared to neurotypical adults, indicating that altered prioritization of visual information may contribute to facial emotion recognition impairment. Results confirm the need for more ecologically valid stimuli for the elucidation of the mechanisms underlying facial emotion recognition difficulty in autistic individuals.
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spelling curtin-20.500.11937-792252020-08-19T05:42:19Z Complex facial emotion recognition and atypical gaze patterns in autistic adults Black, Melissa Chen, Nigel T.M. Lipp, Ottmar Bolte, Sven Girdler, Sonya Social Sciences Psychology, Developmental Psychology eye movement eye tracking facial expression social cognition SPECTRUM DISORDERS INSIGHTS While altered gaze behaviour during facial emotion recognition has been observed in autistic individuals, there remains marked inconsistency in findings, with the majority of previous research focused towards the processing of basic emotional expressions. There is a need to examine whether atypical gaze during facial emotion recognition extends to more complex emotional expressions, which are experienced as part of everyday social functioning. The eye gaze of 20 autistic and 20 IQ-matched neurotypical adults was examined during a facial emotion recognition task of complex, dynamic emotion displays. Autistic adults fixated longer on the mouth region when viewing complex emotions compared to neurotypical adults, indicating that altered prioritization of visual information may contribute to facial emotion recognition impairment. Results confirm the need for more ecologically valid stimuli for the elucidation of the mechanisms underlying facial emotion recognition difficulty in autistic individuals. 2020 Journal Article http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/79225 10.1177/1362361319856969 English SAGE PUBLICATIONS LTD fulltext
spellingShingle Social Sciences
Psychology, Developmental
Psychology
eye movement
eye tracking
facial expression
social cognition
SPECTRUM DISORDERS
INSIGHTS
Black, Melissa
Chen, Nigel T.M.
Lipp, Ottmar
Bolte, Sven
Girdler, Sonya
Complex facial emotion recognition and atypical gaze patterns in autistic adults
title Complex facial emotion recognition and atypical gaze patterns in autistic adults
title_full Complex facial emotion recognition and atypical gaze patterns in autistic adults
title_fullStr Complex facial emotion recognition and atypical gaze patterns in autistic adults
title_full_unstemmed Complex facial emotion recognition and atypical gaze patterns in autistic adults
title_short Complex facial emotion recognition and atypical gaze patterns in autistic adults
title_sort complex facial emotion recognition and atypical gaze patterns in autistic adults
topic Social Sciences
Psychology, Developmental
Psychology
eye movement
eye tracking
facial expression
social cognition
SPECTRUM DISORDERS
INSIGHTS
url http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/79225