Motor, cognitive, and socio-cognitive mechanisms explaining social skills in autism and typical development.
Training executive function and theory of mind together may directly lift social skills in autistic clients .
01Research in Context
What this study did
The team tested 6- to young learners with and without autism.
They measured motor skills, executive function (EF), theory of mind (ToM), and real-life social skills.
Then they used statistics to see which skills best explained social success.
What they found
Motor, EF, and ToM together explained 85 percent of the differences in social skills.
EF and ToM acted like bridges: good motor skills helped social skills only when EF and ToM were also strong.
This means kids can use EF and ToM to make up for weaker motor skills.
How this fits with other research
Granader et al. (2014) saw EF and ToM gaps in preschoolers with autism. The new study shows these gaps still matter in older kids and now link motor skills to social life.
Myers et al. (2018) found EF predicted daily living skills. The 2024 paper widens the lens: EF plus ToM predict social skills too.
Maddox et al. (2015) showed emotion perception partly explains social problems. The new work adds EF and ToM as extra stepping-stones, not replacements.
Fisher et al. (2005) tried short EF or ToM training and saw limited transfer. The 2024 model hints you may need to train both together, not one at a time.
Why it matters
If a client struggles socially, screen motor, EF, and ToM together. Strengthening EF and ToM may unlock gains even when motor skills lag.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
Challenges in social functioning are considered a core criterion for diagnosing autism. Although motor skills, executive functioning (EF), and theory of mind (ToM) abilities independently affect social challenges and are interconnected, these abilities' shared contribution to the explanation of social functioning in autism remains under-investigated. To address this disparity, we examined the motor, EF, and ToM abilities of 148 autistic and non-autistic youth (ages 6-16 years), evaluating these variables' impact on social ability and their interconnections. Our mediation model exploring the contribution of motor, EF, and ToM skills explained 85% of the variance in social functioning (Social Responsiveness Scale-SRS-2). Analysis yielded a direct path from study group to SRS-2-social (typically developing-TD > autistic) and two main parallel indirect joint paths: (a) Group ➔ motor ➔ EF ➔ SRS-2-social; and (b) Group ➔ motor ➔ ToM ➔ SRS-2-social. In two secondary indirect paths, autistic children showed lower motor skills, which in turn explained their higher EF and/or ToM impairment, which in turn explained their higher social skills impairment. Put differently, our results suggest that better EF and TOM proficiency may compensate for poorer motor skills. Findings also indicated that the collective impact of motor, EF, and ToM skills on social functioning, along with the mediating role played by EF and ToM on the social-motor linkage, may contribute to understanding individual differences in the social functioning of autistic children. These conclusions call for the inclusion of motor, EF, and ToM activities into daily practices to facilitate social functioning.
Autism research : official journal of the International Society for Autism Research, 2024 · doi:10.1002/aur.3215