Using eye movements as an index of implicit face recognition in autism spectrum disorder.
Eye-tracking shows kids with autism may silently recognize faces even when they cannot name them.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Hedley et al. (2012) watched where kids with autism looked while they saw faces.
The team used eye-tracking cameras to record tiny eye jumps.
They wanted to know if the kids could recognize faces without being asked.
What they found
Kids with autism said fewer names correctly when asked, "Who is this?"
Yet their eyes still moved like they knew the faces in secret.
The eyes told a different story than the mouth.
How this fits with other research
Ma et al. (2021) pooled many studies and saw the same eye dodge across ages and cultures.
McLennan et al. (2008) seems to disagree: adults with autism looked at eyes just as much as typical adults when the face showed simple feelings.
The gap hides in task type: Darren used unknown faces; D used clear happy or angry faces.
Kikuchi et al. (2011) adds a fix: tell the child, "Look at the eyes," and face attention jumps.
Why it matters
You can stop waiting for perfect name labels. Watch eye drift during table work or play. If the child glances at your eyes longer for familiar staff, he may still be learning faces. Pair that silent cue with a quick name prompt to link the hidden skill to the spoken word.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
Individuals with an autism spectrum disorder (ASD) typically show impairment on face recognition tasks. Performance has usually been assessed using overt, explicit recognition tasks. Here, a complementary method involving eye tracking was used to examine implicit face recognition in participants with ASD and in an intelligence quotient-matched non-ASD control group. Differences in eye movement indices between target and foil faces were used as an indicator of implicit face recognition. Explicit face recognition was assessed using old-new discrimination and reaction time measures. Stimuli were faces of studied (target) or unfamiliar (foil) persons. Target images at test were either identical to the images presented at study or altered by changing the lighting, pose, or by masking with visual noise. Participants with ASD performed worse than controls on the explicit recognition task. Eye movement-based measures, however, indicated that implicit recognition may not be affected to the same degree as explicit recognition. Autism Res 2012, 5: 363-379. © 2012 International Society for Autism Research, Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Autism research : official journal of the International Society for Autism Research, 2012 · doi:10.1002/aur.1246