How young adults with autism spectrum disorder watch and interpret pragmatically complex scenes

The aim of the current study was to investigate subtle characteristics of social perception and interpretation in high-functioning individuals with autism spectrum disorders (ASDs), and to study the relation between watching and interpreting. As a novelty, we used an approach that combined moment-by-moment eye tracking and verbal assessment. Sixteen young adults with ASD and 16 neurotypical control participants watched a video depicting a complex communication situation while their eye movements were tracked. The participants also completed a verbal task with questions related to the pragmatic content of the video. We compared verbal task scores and eye movements between groups, and assessed correlations between task performance and eye movements. Individuals with ASD had more difficulty than the controls in interpreting the video and during two short moments there were significant group differences in eye movements. Additionally, we found significant correlations between verbal task scores and moment-level eye movement in the ASD group, but not among the controls. We concluded that participants with ASD had slight difficulties in understanding the pragmatic content of the video stimulus and attending to social cues, and that the connection between pragmatic understanding and eye movements was more pronounced for participants with ASD than for neurotypical participants.Our Research Report for 2000-2002 reflects an outstanding level of achievement throughout the institution and demonstrates once again our high level of commitment to strategic and applied research particularly in areas that enhance the quality of life.casl70pub4526pub1

Going beyond what is visible:what multichannel data can reveal about interaction in the context of collaborative learning?

Abstract Progress in the development of technology has provided data-capturing devices that make it possible to identify detailed processes in collaborative learning. This study utilized multichannel data, namely physiological data, video observations, and facial recognition data, to explore what they can reveal about types of interaction and regulation of learning during different phases of collaborative learning progress. Participants were five groups of three members each, selected for further study from an initial set of 48 students. The collaborative task was to design a healthy breakfast for an athlete. Empatica sensors were used to capture episodes of simultaneous arousal, and video observations were used to contextualize working phases and types of interaction. Facial expression data were created by post-processing video-recorded data. The results show that simultaneous arousal episodes occurred throughout phases of collaborative learning and the learners presented the most negative facial expressions during the simultaneous arousal episodes. Most of the collaborative interaction during simultaneous arousal was low-level, and regulated learning was not observable. However, when the interaction was high-level, markers of regulated learning were present; when the interaction was confused, it included monitoring activities. This study represents an advance in testing new methods for the objective measurement of social interaction and regulated learning in collaborative contexts

Social-pragmatic inferencing, visual social attention and physiological reactivity to complex social scenes in autistic young adults

Abstract This study examined social-pragmatic inferencing, visual social attention and physiological reactivity to complex social scenes. Participants were autistic young adults (n = 14) and a control group of young adults (n = 14) without intellectual disability. Results indicate between-group differences in social-pragmatic inferencing, moment-level social attention and heart rate variability (HRV) reactivity. A key finding suggests associations between increased moment-level social attention to facial emotion expressions, better social-pragmatic inferencing and greater HRV suppression in autistic young adults. Supporting previous research, better social-pragmatic inferencing was found associated with less autistic traits