孤独症幼儿对面部情绪表情认知特征的初步研究

Cognitive profile of emotional expression in young children with autism

目的探究孤独症患儿对面部情绪表情的认知特征。方法选取2007年3月至2008年9月在中山大学附属第三医院发育行为中心诊断为孤独症的18～36个月患儿作为孤独症组,同期行健康查体的年龄、性别与孤独症组匹配的正常儿童作为对照组,被动观看电脑屏幕显示的高兴、悲伤、惊讶、愤怒和恐惧5种面部基本情绪表情图,观察比较两组幼儿对各种面部表情的视觉注意行为和自身情绪反应。结果研究期间孤独症组和对照组均纳入45例,两组幼儿对各种面部表情的初次注视时间组间效应不明显,而表情效应明显,两组幼儿初次注视高兴和愤怒表情的时间长于注视恐惧表情的时间。但孤独症组对各种面部表情图的回看次数明显少于对照组,总注视时间也明显短于对照组。对照组对不同的面部表情自身情绪反应评分明显不同,对高兴表情的积极情绪评分明显高于其他表情,对高兴表情的消极情绪评分明显低于愤怒和恐惧表情,对悲伤和惊讶表情的消极情绪评分也明显低于恐惧表情。而孤独症组对各种情绪表情的自身情绪反应评分差异无统计学意义。结论孤独症患儿早期不仅对面部情绪表情的视觉注意减少,对面部情绪表情的感知也存在缺陷,尤其对各种负性情绪表情理解困难。

Objective Individuals with autism have been demonstrated to have deficit in cognizing facial expression. This study aimed to explore the cognitive profile of facial emotional expressions in young children with autism. Methods Forty five children with autism and forty five normal controls matched on chronological age and gender were recruited to view passively five kinds of basic facial emotional expression pictures which presented on computer screen in a quiet room. The responses of each child were recorded by a web camera. Then visual attention and self emotional responses of all children toward the emotional expressions were coded from the videotaped observations. Results The data of 82 children were included in the analysis because 8 children did not finish the entire experiment. The difference of the first-looking time toward five kinds of facial expression between groups was not significant while expression effect within group was significantly showed that children looked longer to happy and angry expression than fearful expression at the first time. Autistic children＇s times of back-look and total looking time toward all kinds of facial expression were significantly less than normal controls＇ （ P 〈 0.05 ）. The score of self emotional response to different expression was significantly different in normal children （ P 〈 0.05 ） including positive and negative response, which showed the score of positive emotion toward happy expression was higher than that toward other expressions, the score of negative emotion toward happy expression was lower than that toward angry and fearful expressions and the scores of negative emotion toward sad and surprise expression were also lower than that toward fearful expressions, while that was not obvious in children with autism. Autistic children showed indifferent to all facial expressions or abnormally positive emotional response to negative facial expression as to happy expression. Conclusions Young children with autism not only show less visual attention to facial expression, but also have impairments in perceiving facial expression especially in comprehending negative emotional expressions that maybe relate to early abnormal development of amygdala in autism.