Effects of observing eye contact on gaze following in high-functioning autism

Anne Böckler*, Bert Timmermans, Natalie Sebanz, Kai Vogeley, Leonhard Schilbach

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract (may include machine translation)

Observing eye contact between others enhances the tendency to subsequently follow their gaze and has been suggested to function as a social signal that adds meaning to an upcoming action or event. The present study investigated effects of observed eye contact in high-functioning autism (HFA). Two faces on a screen either looked at or away from each other before providing congruent or incongruent gaze cues to one of two target locations. In contrast to control participants, HFA participants did not depict enhanced gaze following after observing eye contact. Individuals with autism, hence, do not seem to process observed mutual gaze as a social signal indicating the relevance of upcoming (gaze) behaviour. This may be based on the reduced tendency of individuals with HFA to engage in social gaze behavior themselves, and might underlie some of the characteristic deficiencies in social communicative behaviour in autism.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)1651-1658
Number of pages8
JournalJournal of Autism and Developmental Disorders
Volume44
Issue number7
DOIs
StatePublished - Jul 2014

Keywords

  • Gaze following
  • High-functioning autism
  • Joint attention
  • Social cognition

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