Perceptions of distress in young children with autism compared to typically developing children: A cultural comparison between Japan and Italy

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Abstract

This study investigates how adults in two contrasting cultures (Italian and Japanese) perceive episodes of crying of typically developing (TD) children and children with Autism Disorder (AD). Although cries of children with AD have been reported to elicit more distress in Western cultures, it is not known whether similar findings hold in Eastern cultures. In Experiment 1, we artificially modified structural parameters (fundamental frequency, duration of pauses, waveform modulation) of cries and asked Italian and Japanese adults to judge levels of expressed and felt distress in the cries. In Experiment 2, we asked Italian and Japanese adults to report these levels of distress on hearing cries of AD and TD children. In both cultures, cries with higher fundamental frequency and shorter pause durations were judged more distressing and distressed and observers perceived cries of children with AD as more distressing and distressed than cries of TD children. The similar responses in adults from two contrasting societies constitute evidence that reactions to cries of children with AD might be universal.

Highlights

► Crying episodes with high fundamental frequency and short pauses are perceived as distressing and distressed in both Italy and Japan. ► Episodes of crying of children with autism tend to be considered more distressed and distressing than those of typically developing children. ► Contrasting adults in two different societies (Italy and Japan) constitutes a strong test of hypotheses that atypical responses to AD episodes of crying might be universal.

Section snippets

General method

The two experiments were approved by the Ethical Committee of the Department of Cognitive Sciences of the University of Trento and the ethical board of the Faculty of Education at Chiba University (Japan). Informed consent was obtained from all participants.

Participants

A total of about 200 adults were recruited in the urban areas of two cities, Trento in Italy and Chiba in Japan. Participants in the two countries were matched for age, gender, and socioeconomic status. Invitation to participate to the study was made through telephone calls to people belonging to databases of volunteers available at University of Trento and Chiba University.

Procedure

Audio files were presented randomly to the participants (recorded at 44,100 Hz with a stereo resolution of 32 bit) using a personal computer and a headset. During stimulus presentation, no images were displayed on the computer screen. Participants were asked to rate the level of distress expressed in the cries (by which we mean the perceived distress of the child) and to rate the level of distress they felt (by which mean distress felt by the adult observer) while listening to the cries.

Preliminary analyses

Prior to data analysis, univariate and multivariate distributions of Expressed Distress and of Felt Distress scores were examined for normality, homogeneity of variance, outliers, and influential cases (Fox, 1997). All variables were normally distributed. The distance of each case to the centroid was evaluated to screen for multidimensional outliers (Fox, 1997). No significant differences emerged between parent and nonparent or between female and male participants. For this reason parents and

Participants

A total of 100 Italian adults recruited in the urban area of Trento [50 parents (25 F age M = 31.1, SD = 4.1; 25 M age M = 34.9, SD = 3.1) and 50 non-parents (25 F age M = 27.8, SD = 3.5; 25 M age M = 28.9, SD = 2.5)] and 90 Japanese adults recruited in the urban area of Chiba [45 parents (23 F age M = 31.9, SD = 5.6; 22 M age M = 31.3, SD = 2.9) and 45 non-parents (23 F age M = 27.9, SD = 3.0; 22 M age M = 27.1, SD = 5.8)] participated. The participants in the two countries had a comparable socioeconomic status, ranging medium

Participants

A total of 80 Italian adults recruited in the urban area of Trento [40 parents (20 F age M = 32.2, SD = 3.9; 20 M age M = 35.2, SD = 6.1) and 40 non-parents (20 F age M = 26.6, SD = 2.8; 20 M age M = 29.6, SD = 2.1)] and 80 Japanese adults recruited in the urban area of Chiba [40 parents (20 F age M = 31.5, SD = 5.9; 20 M age M = 30.9, SD = 6.2) and 40 non-parents (20 F age M = 28.3, SD = 5.1; 20 M age M = 26.5, SD = 3.6)] participated in Experiment 2. The participants in the two countries had a comparable socioeconomic status,

General discussion

In two experiments, we investigated how adults in two contrasting cultures perceive typical and atypical infant cries. As expected, in the first experiment we found that experimental manipulations of acoustical parameters of a cry episode modified listener perceptions of distress similarly in Italian and Japanese samples. In particular, cries with modified fundamental frequency or with shorter pauses were perceived as more distressed. These findings accord with the observation that

Acknowledgements

All the participants in this study are gratefully acknowledged as are all the families that made available the home videos from which the stimuli were extracted. We thank E. Horn (NIH, NICHD) for assistance. This research was supported by the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS PE09064), the FPR Program (RIKEN Brain Science Institute), the Intramural Research Program of the DiSCoF, University of Trento (Italy), and the Intramural Research Program of the NIH, NICHD (USA).

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