LAUSR

ABSTRACT Communication deficits in children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) are often related to inefficient interpretation of emotional cues, which are conveyed visually through both facial expressions and body language. The present study examined ASD behavioral and ERP responses to emotional expressions of anger and fear, as conveyed by the face and body. Behavioral results showed significantly faster response times for the ASD than for the typically developing (TD) group when processing fear, but not anger, in isolated face expressions, isolated body expressions, and in the integration of the two. In addition, EEG data for the N170 and P1 indicated processing differences between fear and anger stimuli only in TD group, suggesting that individuals with ASD may not be distinguishing between emotional expressions. These results suggest that ASD children may employ a different neural mechanism for visual emotion recognition than their TD peers, possibly relying on inferential processing. HighlightsChildren on autism spectrum (ASD) viewed facial and body cues of fear and anger.N170 and P1 of TD group reflected differences between fear and anger processing.EEG of ASD group showed earlier N170 on the right when viewing mismatched stimuli.TD and ASD participants used different neural mechanisms of emotion identification.