Emotion recognition in children and adolescents with autism spectrum disorders.

Kuusikko et al. (2009) compared how well kids with autism and typical kids name emotions from photos. They used a standard test that mixes happy, sad, angry and blended faces. The group had both children and teenagers so the team could see if skill grows with age.

Youth with autism scored lower than peers on every emotion. Older teens with autism did better than younger kids with autism, but only on tricky blended faces. Basic happy or sad faces stayed hard even for the older group.

Gross (2008) ran a near-copy study one year earlier and saw the same deficit, so the result is solid. Brosnan et al. (2015) flipped the script: they showed that teens with autism actually beat typical peers when the faces were still cartoon pictures, not real photos. This is not a contradiction — it shows the deficit can vanish if you pick the right picture type.

Tell et al. (2015) added extra background clues. When face and background disagreed, kids with autism stuck with the face while typical kids trusted the background. That finding extends Sanna’s work by showing that autistic learners don’t easily shift to context.

Olsson et al. (2001) had already shown that slow-moving faces help preschoolers with autism match emotions just as well as controls. Sanna’s 2009 static test missed that motion boost, so the gap you see may shrink if you add gentle movement.

For your next social-skills session, use high-intensity cartoon faces or slow-motion clips before you jump to real photos. Teach younger clients blended-emotion labels early, since that’s where age gains show up. And when you add context photos, prompt them to look at background cues so they don’t rely on face alone.