Trait Autism is a Better Predictor of Empathy than Alexithymia

Table 2 Regression and dominance analyses for overall, cognitive and affective empathy

Predictor	β	t	p	sr ²	GDW
(i) Overall empathy—F(3, 302) = 39.22, R² = 0.28, p < .001
Sex (1 = male, 0 = female)	− .18	− 3.64	< .001	0.042	0.050
Autism	− .34	− 6.26	< .001	0.115	0.147
Alexithymia	− .19	− 3.33	.001	0.035	0.084
(ii) Cognitive empathy—F(4, 301) = 65.99, R² = 0.47, p < .001
Affective empathy	.46	9.66	< .001	0.236	0.199
Sex	.17	3.60	< .001	0.041	0.014
Autism	− .28	− 5.82	< .001	0.101	0.143
Alexithymia	− .26	− 5.49	< .001	0.091	0.053
(iii) Affective empathy—F(4, 301) = 50.08, R² = 0.40, p < .001
Cognitive empathy	.52	9.66	< .001	0.236	0.212
Sex	− .38	− 8.34	< .001	0.187	0.148
Autism	− .004	− 0.08	.94	0.00003	0.025
Alexithymia	.13	2.48	.014	0.020	0.014

Examination of VIF values across the regression analyses indicated that multicollinearity was not a concern (all < 10), and the residuals were normally distributed. Durbin–Watson statistics were inspected and found to be ~ 2 across the regression analyses, suggesting that errors were uncorrelated and thus independent. Together, the data were suitable for multiple linear regression analysis
Β standardized regression coefficient, t Student’s t-statistic, p p value, sr² semi-partial correlation squared, GDW General Dominance Weight (higher GDW values indicate a more important predictor)