Sasson Noah J, Shasteen Jonathon R, Pinkham Amy E
The University of Texas at Dallas, Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 800 W. Campbell Rd, GR41, Richardson, TX, 75080, USA.
J Autism Dev Disord. 2016 Apr;46(4):1471-6. doi: 10.1007/s10803-015-2664-6.
Typically-developing (TD) adults detect angry faces more efficiently within a crowd than non-threatening faces. Prior studies of this social threat superiority effect (TSE) in ASD using tasks consisting of schematic faces and homogeneous crowds have produced mixed results. Here, we employ a more ecologically-valid test of the social TSE and find evidence of a reduced social TSE in adults with ASD (n = 21) relative to TD controls (n = 28). Unlike TD participants, the ASD group failed to show the normative advantage for detecting angry faces faster than happy faces, either within crowds of neutral or emotional faces. These findings parallel prior work indicating a reduced sensitivity in ASD to facial cues of untrustworthiness, and may reflect a vulnerability for evaluating social harm.
典型发育（TD）的成年人在人群中比无威胁的面孔更能有效地检测出生气的面孔。先前使用由示意性面孔和同质人群组成的任务对自闭症谱系障碍（ASD）中的这种社会威胁优势效应（TSE）进行的研究结果不一。在这里，我们采用了一种更具生态效度的社会TSE测试，发现相对于TD对照组（n = 28），患有ASD的成年人（n = 21）的社会TSE有所降低。与TD参与者不同，ASD组在中性或情绪化面孔的人群中，未能表现出比检测快乐面孔更快地检测出生气面孔的正常优势。这些发现与先前的研究结果一致，表明ASD对不可信面部线索的敏感性降低，并且可能反映出评估社会伤害的易感性。
