Funawatari Ren, Sumiya Motofumi, Iwabuchi Toshiki, Nishimura Tomoko, Komeda Hidetsugu, Senju Atsushi
United Graduate School of Child Development, Osaka University, Kanazawa University, Hamamatsu University School of Medicine, Chiba University, University of Fukui, Osaka, Japan.
Research Center for Child Mental Development, Hamamatsu University School of Medicine, Hamamatsu, Japan.
J Autism Dev Disord. 2024 Jul 23. doi: 10.1007/s10803-024-06481-5.
Many autistic people reportedly engage in camouflaging to navigate everyday social interactions; however, the function of this behavior remains largely unknown. We hypothesized that autistic people camouflage more toward neurotypical others than toward autistic others, employing it as a strategy to "fit in" within the neurotypical-majority community. This study aimed to empirically investigate this hypothesis for the first time. Autistic and neurotypical participants took part in a web-based survey. Data from 48 autistic and 137 neurotypical participants were analyzed. Camouflaging toward autistic and neurotypical others was separately measured using the modified Camouflaging Autistic Traits Questionnaire (CAT-Q). For each CAT-Q item, a sentence describing a hypothetical interaction partner with autistic or neurotypical characteristics was added, creating respective sentence conditions. The interaction effect of the participants' characteristics and sentence conditions was analyzed using a multilevel regression analysis, accounting for differing individual baselines. The analysis revealed an interaction effect between participants' characteristics and sentence conditions. The autistic group showed significantly more camouflaging in the autistic sentence condition than in the neurotypical sentence condition. Conversely, the neurotypical group did not differ significantly in camouflaging levels in the sentence conditions. Contrary to our hypothesis, autistic people demonstrated more camouflaging toward autistic others than toward neurotypical others. This finding questions the assumption that autistic people camouflage to assimilate into a neurotypical-majority society. Instead, it could be conceptualized as a more general social strategy used by autistic people aiming to improve their relationships with others.
据报道，许多自闭症患者会采用伪装的方式来应对日常社交互动；然而，这种行为的功能在很大程度上仍不为人知。我们假设，自闭症患者对非自闭症人群比对自闭症人群伪装得更多，将其作为一种在非自闭症人群占多数的社区中“融入”的策略。本研究旨在首次对这一假设进行实证调查。自闭症患者和非自闭症参与者参与了一项基于网络的调查。对48名自闭症患者和137名非自闭症参与者的数据进行了分析。使用修改后的自闭症特征伪装问卷（CAT-Q）分别测量对自闭症人群和非自闭症人群的伪装情况。对于每个CAT-Q项目，添加了一个描述具有自闭症或非自闭症特征的假设互动伙伴的句子，创建了各自的句子条件。使用多级回归分析，考虑不同的个体基线，分析参与者特征和句子条件的交互作用。分析揭示了参与者特征和句子条件之间的交互作用。自闭症组在自闭症句子条件下的伪装明显多于在非自闭症句子条件下的伪装。相反，非自闭症组在不同句子条件下的伪装水平没有显著差异。与我们的假设相反，自闭症患者对自闭症人群的伪装比对非自闭症人群的伪装更多。这一发现对自闭症患者伪装是为了融入非自闭症占多数的社会这一假设提出了质疑。相反，它可以被概念化为自闭症患者用来改善他们与他人关系的一种更普遍的社交策略。
