scholarly journals Absence of contagious yawning in children with autism spectrum disorder

2007 ◽  
Vol 3 (6) ◽  
pp. 706-708 ◽  
Author(s):  
Atsushi Senju ◽  
Makiko Maeda ◽  
Yukiko Kikuchi ◽  
Toshikazu Hasegawa ◽  
Yoshikuni Tojo ◽  
...  

This study is the first to report the disturbance of contagious yawning in individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Twenty-four children with ASD as well as 25 age-matched typically developing (TD) children observed video clips of either yawning or control mouth movements. Yawning video clips elicited more yawns in TD children than in children with ASD, but the frequency of yawns did not differ between groups when they observed control video clips. Moreover, TD children yawned more during or after the yawn video clips than the control video clips, but the type of video clips did not affect the amount of yawning in children with ASD. Current results suggest that contagious yawning is impaired in ASD, which may relate to their impairment in empathy. It supports the claim that contagious yawning is based on the capacity for empathy.

2013 ◽  
Vol 2013 ◽  
pp. 1-8 ◽  
Author(s):  
Saori Usui ◽  
Atsushi Senju ◽  
Yukiko Kikuchi ◽  
Hironori Akechi ◽  
Yoshikuni Tojo ◽  
...  

Most previous studies suggest diminished susceptibility to contagious yawning in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). However, it could be driven by their atypical attention to the face. To test this hypothesis, children with ASD and typically developing (TD) children were shown yawning and control movies. To ensure participants' attention to the face, an eye tracker controlled the onset of the yawning and control stimuli. Results demonstrated that both TD children and children with ASD yawned more frequently when they watched the yawning stimuli than the control stimuli. It is suggested therefore that the absence of contagious yawning in children with ASD, as reported in previous studies, might relate to their weaker tendency to spontaneously attend to others' faces.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Aida Khozaei ◽  
Hadi Moradi ◽  
Reshad Hosseini ◽  
Hamidreza Pouretemad ◽  
Bahareh Eskandari

AbstractDue to the importance of automatic and early autism screening, in this paper, a cry-based screening approach for children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is introduced. During the study, we realized that the ASD specific features are not necessarily observable among all children with ASD and among all instances of each child. Therefore, we proposed a new classification approach to be able to find such features and their corresponding instances. We tested the proposed approach and found two features that can be used to distinguish groups of children with ASD from Typically Developing (TD) children. In other words, these features are present in subsets of children with ASD not all of them. The approach has been tested on a dataset including 14 boys and 7 girls with ASD and 14 TD boys and 7 TD girls, between 18 to 53 months old. The sensitivity, specificity, and precision of the proposed approach for boys were 85.71%, 100%, and 92.85%, respectively. These measures were 71.42%, 100%, and 85.71% for girls, respectively.


2019 ◽  
Vol 47 (1) ◽  
pp. 205-224 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hanako YOSHIDA ◽  
Paul CIRINO ◽  
Sarah S. MIRE ◽  
Joseph M. BURLING ◽  
Sunbok LEE

AbstractThe present study focused on parents’ social cue use in relation to young children's attention. Participants were ten parent–child dyads; all children were 36 to 60 months old and were either typically developing (TD) or were diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Children wore a head-mounted camera that recorded the proximate child view while their parent played with them. The study compared the following between the TD and ASD groups: (a) frequency of parent's gesture use; (b) parents’ monitoring of their child's face; and (c) how children looked at parents’ gestures. Results from Bayesian estimation indicated that, compared to the TD group, parents of children with ASD produced more gestures, more closely monitored their children's faces, and provided more scaffolding for their children's visual experiences. Our findings suggest the importance of further investigating parents’ visual and gestural scaffolding as a potential developmental mechanism for children's early learning, including for children with ASD.


Author(s):  
Eva Jiménez ◽  
Eileen Haebig ◽  
Thomas T. Hills

Abstract This study compares the lexical composition of 118 children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) aged 12 to 84 months with 4626 vocabulary-matched typically developing toddlers with and without language delay, aged 8 to 30 months. Children with ASD and late talkers showed a weaker noun bias. Additionally, differences were identified in the proportion of nouns and verbs, and in the semantic categories of animals, toys, household items and vehicles. Most differences appear to reflect the extent of the age differences between the groups. However, children with ASD produced fewer high-social verbs than typical talkers and late talkers, a difference that might be associated with ASD features. In sum, our findings identified areas of overlap and distinction across the developing lexical profiles.


2015 ◽  
Vol 58 (2) ◽  
pp. 373-382 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wing-Chee So ◽  
Ming Lui ◽  
Tze-Kiu Wong ◽  
Long-Tin Sit

Purpose The current study examined whether children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), in comparison with typically developing children, perceive and produce gestures to identify nonpresent objects (i.e., referent-identifying gestures), which is crucial for communicating ideas in a discourse. Method An experimenter described the uses of daily-life objects to 6- to 12-year-old children both orally and with gestures. The children were then asked to describe how they performed daily activities using those objects. Results All children gestured. A gesture identified a nonpresent referent if it was produced in the same location that had previously been established by the experimenter. Children with ASD gestured at the specific locations less often than typically developing children. Verbal and spatial memory were positively correlated with the ability to produce referent-identifying gestures for all children. However, the positive correlation between Raven's Children Progressive Matrices score and the production of referent-identifying gestures was found only in children with ASD. Conclusions Children with ASD might be less able to perceive and produce referent-identifying gestures and may rely more heavily on visual–spatial skills in producing referent-identifying gestures. The results have clinical implications for designing an intervention program to enhance the ability of children with ASD to communicate about nonpresent objects with gestures.


Author(s):  
Benjamin L. Handen ◽  
Johanna Taylor ◽  
Rameshwari Tumuluru

Abstract One of the most frequently reported behavioral concerns among children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is high rates of activity and inattention, symptoms that are often associated with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Although there is a considerable body of research regarding the appropriate treatment of ADHD symptoms among typically developing children, the research among children with ASD is more limited. The evidence to date suggests that medication response rates among children with ASD are considerably lower than among typically developing children and that children with ASD tend to be at greater risk for experiencing side effects. The purpose of the present paper is to review the available research on the treatment of ADHD symptoms in children with ASD. This paper summarizes the data on a range of pharmacological options and provides specific recommendations for how best to clinically manage these symptoms.


Motor Control ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 24 (1) ◽  
pp. 127-149
Author(s):  
Breanna E. Studenka ◽  
Kodey Myers

Children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) exhibit impairment in helping someone else with a motor action, which may arise from impairment in selecting and preparing motor responses. Five children with ASD and five typically developing children performed a cooperative motor planning task that required them to reach for, lift, and hand an object (hammer or stick) to a researcher. The response, movement, and grasp time were measured. Children with ASD grasped the object longer on trials where they helped, indicating that the action was planned in sequence versus as a whole (i.e., prior to the onset of movement). The hammer object elicited a quicker response than the stick, suggesting the facilitation of planning by tools with inherent action properties. Finally, the increased helping of children with ASD was not mirrored by changes in the response, movement, or grasp time.


2019 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
pp. 383-393 ◽  
Author(s):  
Molly S. Helt ◽  
Deborah A. Fein ◽  
Jacob E. Vargas

AbstractAlthough deficits in cognitive empathy are well established in individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), the literature on emotional empathy, or emotional contagion, in individuals with ASD is sparse and contradictory. The authors tested susceptibility to contagious yawning and laughter in children with ASD (n = 60) and typically developing (TD) children (n = 60), ages 5–17 years, under various conditions, to elucidate factors that may affect emotional contagion in these populations. Although TD children showed equal amounts of emotional contagion across conditions, children with ASD were highly influenced by the familiarity of the target stimulus, as well as task instructions that encourage eye gaze to target. More specifically, children with ASD exhibited less contagious yawning and laughter than their TD peers except when their attention was explicitly directed to the eyes or (and even more so) when their parents served as the stimulus targets. The authors explore the implications of these findings for theories about the mechanisms underlying empathic deficits in ASD as well as the clinical implications of having parents involved in treatment.


2020 ◽  
Vol 38 (1) ◽  
pp. 232-255
Author(s):  
Huso Yi ◽  
Queenie K. Y. Siu

Children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) can benefit from greater social integration through positive peer relationships. The study aimed to understand children’s views toward autism as well as experiences of interactions between children with ASD and typically developing (TD) peers. After ethnographic observations in a mainstream primary school educating diverse students, interviews were conducted with 10 students with ASD and ten of their TD peers using open-ended and vignette questions about three hypothetical scenarios set in varied contexts: a classroom, a birthday party, and a public setting. Narrative analysis focused on how the children constructed their experiences in response to these vignettes. Children with ASD frequently experienced isolation in peer interactions. While their TD peers favored interactions with those with ASD, believing that their behaviors of concern are extrinsic and their intentions must be good, their lack of understanding of ASD and of social skills that could be used to facilitate more positive interactions could result in unintended harm and exclusion. Early school-based intervention would assist in increasing the acceptance of neurodevelopmental differences and diversity.


Author(s):  
Cheriece K. Carter ◽  
Calum Hartley

Abstract For the first time, this study investigated whether children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and typically developing (TD) children matched on language comprehension (M age equivalent =  ~ 44 months) are more likely to retain words when learning from colour photographs than black-and-white cartoons. Participants used mutual exclusivity to fast map novel word-picture relationships and retention was assessed following a 5-min delay. Children with ASD achieved significantly greater retention accuracy when learning from photographs rather than cartoons and, surprisingly, responded more accurately than TD children when learning from photographs. Our results demonstrate that children with ASD benefit from greater iconicity when learning words from pictures, providing a data-grounded rationale for using colour photographs when administering picture-based interventions.


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