Automated recognition of spontaneous facial expression in individuals with autism spectrum disorder: parsing response variability.
Abigail Bangerter, Meenakshi Chatterjee, Joseph Manfredonia and 10 others
PMID 32393350WHAT IT FOUND
People with autism showed less lip-corner smile movement to funny videos than controls, but some smiled much more.
Caregiver-reported impulsivity tracked with this variability.
Key findings
01The autism group had lower average AU12, a lip corner puller feature, than the typically developing group, and no other measured facial features differed significantly.
02The autism group split into 35 over-responsive participants with higher AU6 and AU12 values and 89 under-responsive participants with lower AU6 and AU12 values.
03In the whole autism group, caregiver-reported impulsivity was significantly correlated with AU12 area under the curve, AU6 area under the curve, and average AU6.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for SLPs
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What it does not show
The study was exploratory and did not account for multiple comparisons. The autism group had 124 participants and the typically developing group had 41, and the typically developing group did not have IQ characterization. Reduced facial expression did not mean reduced happiness or emotional arousal, because internal emotional experience was not measured. Participants were in a study room with staff present and knew they were being recorded, which may have changed facial responses. The study did not measure alexithymia, a factor that may relate to facial expression differences. Facial expression was measured only when participants faced the screen, not as a guarantee of attention.
Declared interests
The paper states that Janssen Research and Development was the funder. The supplied text does not list author conflict-of-interest statements.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that people with autism all show flat facial responses or that reduced facial movement means less happiness. The autism group split into over-responsive and under-responsive subgroups, and the study did not measure emotional experience.