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Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders

Gepubliceerd in:

01-10-2007 | Original Paper

The Problem with Using Eye-Gaze to Infer Desire: A Deficit of Cue Inference in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder?

Auteurs: Catherine S. Ames, Christopher Jarrold

Gepubliceerd in: Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders | Uitgave 9/2007

Abstract

Children with autism respond atypically to eye-gaze cues, arguably because they fail to understand that eye-gaze conveys mentalistic information. Three experiments investigated whether a difficulty in inferring desire from eye-gaze in autism reflects a failure to understand the mentalistic significance of eye-gaze, an inhibitory deficit or a deficit of cue inference. While there was an inhibitory component to the tasks, children with autism were no more affected by this than controls. In addition, individuals’ impairment in inferring desire was not limited to social cues, but was also observed when desire was cued by more general cues. Consequently, children with autism may have a general deficit in using arbitrary cues to make inferences, which impacts particularly on their social development.

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Titel: The Problem with Using Eye-Gaze to Infer Desire: A Deficit of Cue Inference in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder?
Auteurs: Catherine S. Ames
Christopher Jarrold
Publicatiedatum: 01-10-2007
Uitgeverij: Springer US
Gepubliceerd in: Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders / Uitgave 9/2007
Print ISSN: 0162-3257
Elektronisch ISSN: 1573-3432
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-006-0309-5

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