Autistic Traits and Symptoms of Social Anxiety are Differentially Related to Attention to Others' Eyes in Social Anxiety Disorder.
Johan Lundin Kleberg, Jens Högström, Martina Nord and 3 others
PMID 28000078WHAT IT FOUND
In adolescents with social anxiety, higher autistic traits predicted slower initial gaze toward eyes, while higher social anxiety predicted faster gaze aversion.
This suggests autistic traits reduce social interest, whereas anxiety drives avoidance, offering distinct behavioral markers for these overlapping conditions.
Key findings
01Participants with higher levels of autistic traits took longer to orient towards the eyes.
02Participants with higher social anxiety were quicker to reorient away from the eyes once they were fixated.
03The association between social anxiety and looking away from eyes was statistically stronger than the association between autistic traits and looking away.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they found
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What it does not show
The sample size was very small (n=25), with only 4 male participants, limiting generalizability. All participants had a formal diagnosis of SAD, so the findings may not apply to people with autism who do not have social anxiety. The study was cross-sectional and correlational, so it cannot prove that these eye-tracking patterns cause the symptoms or that they can be used for diagnosis. The results are based on a specific eye-tracking paradigm that may not reflect real-world social interactions.
Declared interests
No conflicts of interest were declared in the provided text.
The easy way to misread this
Do not use these eye-tracking patterns as a diagnostic tool. The study shows a correlation in a small group of adolescents with social anxiety, but it does not establish that these specific gaze behaviors can reliably distinguish between autism and social anxiety in individual patients.