Social Anxiety Reduces Visual Attention to the Eyes of Emotional Faces in Autistic Youth.
Parents see more anxiety than their autistic kids report, especially when autism traits are strong.
01Research in Context
What this study did
The team asked kids with autism and their parents to rate the child's anxiety.
They also tracked where the kids looked when faces showed happy, angry, or neutral eyes.
All kids were verbal and aged 8-18.
What they found
Parents gave higher anxiety scores than their kids did, but only in the autism-plus-anxiety group.
The gap grew wider when autism traits were stronger.
Kids with more autism traits also looked less at the eye region of emotional faces.
How this fits with other research
Tassé et al. (2013) found no threat-attention bias in autistic youth, so eye avoidance may be tied to social anxiety, not general anxiety.
Adams et al. (2020) showed 96% of autistic kids self-report anxiety; the new study adds that parents still rate it even higher when autism traits are strong.
Capio et al. (2013) saw lower autism severity linked to higher anxiety, while the current paper shows higher severity widens the parent-child rating gap. The two findings sit side-by-side because they measure different things: one predicts anxiety level, the other predicts informant disagreement.
Why it matters
Collect both parent and child anxiety ratings, then check autism severity before deciding whose report to weigh. If the child has many autism traits, lean toward the parent's view and teach eye-contact skills in small steps to lower social anxiety.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
Co-occurring anxiety is common in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). However, inconsistencies across parent and child reports of anxiety may complicate the assessment of anxiety in this population. The present study examined parent and child anxiety ratings in children with ASD with and without anxiety disorders and tested the association between parent-child anxiety rating discrepancy and ASD symptom severity. Participants included children aged 8-16 years in three diagnostic groups: ASD with co-occurring anxiety disorders (ASD + Anxiety; n = 34), ASD without co-occurring anxiety disorders (ASD; n = 18), and typically developing healthy controls (TD; n = 50). Parents and children completed ratings of child anxiety using the Multidimensional Anxiety Rating Scale. Patterns of parent and child anxiety ratings differed among the three groups, with parent ratings exceeding child ratings only in the ASD + Anxiety group. Parents reported higher levels of child anxiety in the ASD + Anxiety versus ASD group, whereas children reported comparable levels of anxiety in the two groups. Among children with ASD, ASD symptom severity was positively associated with the degree to which parent ratings exceeded child ratings. Results suggest that children with ASD and co-occurring anxiety disorders endorse some anxiety symptoms but may underreport overall levels of anxiety. In addition, ASD symptom severity might increase discrepancies in parent-child anxiety ratings. These findings suggest a unique and valuable role of child anxiety ratings and suggest that both parent and child anxiety ratings should be considered in light of children's ASD symptom severity and used to guide further assessment. Autism Res 2020, 13: 93-103. © 2019 International Society for Autism Research, Wiley Periodicals, Inc. LAY SUMMARY: Children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) commonly experience anxiety; yet, their perceptions of their anxiety might differ from their parents' perceptions. This study found that, while children with ASD and anxiety disorders acknowledge some anxiety, their parents report them as having higher levels of anxiety. Also, child and parent perceptions of anxiety may differ more for children with more severe ASD symptoms. How these findings may guide research and clinical practice is discussed.
Journal of autism and developmental disorders, 2026 · doi:10.1111/j.1468-2850.2010.01220.x