A Comparison of Recognition of Facial Emotion Expressions in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder and Normal Children

Originally, children recognize other people’s emotional expressions through an emotional transmission process that is approximately automatic. Happiness, sadness, fear and anger are some of the main internal emotions which can be directly perceived by facial expressions. Children’s reaction to the emotions demonstrate their ability to recognize and interpret them. Researches evaluating Deficit in emotional recognition of autistic children leads to conflicting results. The aim of this study is to compare recognition of six basic facial expressions and reaction times in children with and without autism spectrum disorder. For this purpose, utilizing a comparative research design, 20 children with autism spectrum disorder - selected by the use of convenience sampling method- were compared with 20 typically developing age-matched control subjects in facial emotional recognition and reaction time. Multivariate Covariance Analysis results showed significant differences between two groups in reaction time and recognition of emotions. It was revealed that performance of autistic children in facial emotion recognition was slower and less accurate than normal children. In this study, it is confirmed that children with autism spectrum disorder have a deficit in recognizing emotional expression in faces.