Over-Responsiveness and Greater Variability in Roughness Perception in Autism.
Autistic touch reports are naturally noisier—plan for the scatter.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Eussen et al. (2016) asked adults to feel the same smooth surface many times. Half the adults had autism, half did not. After each touch, they said how rough it felt.
The team counted how high and how spread-out the roughness ratings were.
What they found
Autistic adults called the surface rougher than non-autistic adults. Their ratings also jumped around more from trial to trial.
The extra noise is not sloppy data. It is part of how their touch system works.
How this fits with other research
Hoch et al. (1994) saw the same jumpy touch responses in kids with developmental disabilities. The new study shows the pattern lasts into adulthood.
Sapey-Triomphe et al. (2021) and Binur et al. (2022) give a reason: autistic brains update expectations slowly, so each touch feels a little different.
Emerson et al. (2007) looks like the opposite: their autistic kids with ID smiled and sought more touch. The clash fades when you see they were little kids with extra needs, not adults rating roughness.
Why it matters
When you test tactile defensiveness, expect wide score swings. Do not blame the client or the protocol. Instead, take more samples and look for personal patterns. Share the variability with caregivers so they understand why today’s “soft” shirt may feel “scratchy” tomorrow.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
Although sensory problems, including tactile hypersensitivity and hyposensitivity (DSM-5) are commonly associated with autism, there is a dearth of systematic and rigorous research in this domain. Here, we report findings from a psychophysical experiment that explored differences in tactile perception between individuals with autism and typically developing control participants, who, using their index finger, rated a series of surfaces on the extent of their roughness. Each surface was rated multiple times and we calculated both the average rating and the variability across trials. Relative to controls, the individuals with autism perceived the surfaces as rougher overall and exhibited greater variability in their ratings across trials. These findings characterize altered tactile perception in autism and suggest that sensory problems in autism may be the product of overly responsive and variable sensory processing.
Autism research : official journal of the International Society for Autism Research, 2016 · doi:10.1002/aur.1505