Brief report: decoding representations: how children with autism understand drawings.
Children with autism can read pictures when the pictures link to their own plan, so let them draw, label, and keep the art for later talk.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Allen (2009) watched children with autism look at drawings.
Some pictures were their own. Some looked almost the same but were drawn by another child.
The kids had to pick which sheet was theirs. The team also checked if the children used an adult’s eye gaze as a hint.
What they found
The children could pick their own picture when they remembered making it.
They did not use the adult’s gaze to figure anything out.
Memory of their own plan worked; watching eyes did not.
How this fits with other research
Congiu et al. (2016) saw the same gaze blind spot. Their task used toys instead of drawings, so the trouble is real across setups.
Gunby et al. (2017) then taught three kids to follow gaze with simple prompts and praise. All learners got the skill the 2009 children lacked.
Cooper (1997) argued that visual cues beat spoken ones for autism. The 2009 study adds a twist: a self-made visual (the child’s own drawing) is even easier to read than an adult’s eyes.
Why it matters
If you want a child to grasp that pictures carry meaning, start with pictures the child creates. Let them label or tell a story about the drawing right after they finish. This ties the picture to their own intent and builds early representation skills without relying on gaze cues they may not notice.
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Join Free →After a drawing activity, ask the child to name the picture and tape it in view; return to it later and say, “Tell me about your picture,” to practice self-referenced meaning.
02At a glance
03Original abstract
Young typically developing children can reason about abstract depictions if they know the intention of the artist. Children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), who are notably impaired in social, 'intention monitoring' domains, may have great difficulty in decoding vague representations. In Experiment 1, children with ASD are unable to use another person's eye gaze as a cue for figuring out what an abstract picture represents. In contrast, when the participants themselves are the artists (Experiment 2), children with ASD are equally proficient as controls at identifying their own perceptually identical pictures (e.g. lollipop and balloon) after a delay, based upon what they intended them to be. Results are discussed in terms of intention and understanding of visual representation in autism.
Journal of autism and developmental disorders, 2009 · doi:10.1007/s10803-008-0650-y