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Impaired Recognition of Negative Facial Expressions is Partly Related to Facial Perception Deficits in Adolescents with High-Functioning Autism Spectrum Disorder

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Abstract

Accumulating studies have reported facial emotion recognition or facial perception impairments in autism spectrum disorder (ASD). To clarify the specificity of the emotion recognition impairment, this study examined the relationships between facial emotion recognition and facial perception abilities in ASD. Twenty-two adolescents with high-functioning ASD (20 males) and 22 typically developing (TD) adolescents (16 males) aged 11–18 years undertook a facial emotion labeling task and a facial perception test. We found that adolescents with ASD had deficits in recognizing negative facial expressions, which correlated with both facial perception deficits and severity of social impairment. In addition, the emotion recognition deficits remained after adjusting for facial perception performance. Thus, our findings suggest an emotion-specific impairment in facial emotion recognition in ASD.

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Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank Buddhist Tai Hung College, Chi Lin Buddhist Secondary School, Heep Hong Society, New Life Psychiatric Rehabilitation Association, City of Love, and Parents’ Association of Pre-school Handicapped Children for their assistance in subject recruitment. Appreciation is extended to all adolescents and parents who participated in this research project.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Neurology and Neurosurgery, Montreal Neurological Institute, McGill University, Montreal, QC, H3A 2B4, Canada

    Michael K. Yeung

  2. Neuropsychology Laboratory, Department of Psychology, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shatin, New Territories, Hong Kong SAR, China

    Michael K. Yeung, Tsz L. Lee & Agnes S. Chan

  3. Chanwuyi Research Center for Neuropsychological Well-being, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shatin, New Territories, Hong Kong SAR, China

    Agnes S. Chan

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  1. Michael K. Yeung
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  2. Tsz L. Lee
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Contributions

MY contributed to the conceptualization of the study. MY and TL contributed to the subject recruitment and data collection. MY undertook the data analysis and prepared the initial draft of the manuscript. MY, TL, and AC significantly contributed to the later versions of the manuscript, and read and approved the final version of the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Agnes S. Chan.

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All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

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Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

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Yeung, M.K., Lee, T.L. & Chan, A.S. Impaired Recognition of Negative Facial Expressions is Partly Related to Facial Perception Deficits in Adolescents with High-Functioning Autism Spectrum Disorder. J Autism Dev Disord 50, 1596–1606 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-019-03915-3

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