Face processing in Autism Spectrum Conditions: the role of alexithymia, mood disorder symptoms and gaze behaviour

Autism Spectrum Conditions (ASC) are often associated with atypical gaze behaviour and face processing. Facial emotion recognition (FER) specifically appears to be impaired in ASC, although alexithymia has been argued to actually be the factor driving atypical FER. Additionally, anxiety and depression are prevalent co-occurring conditions alongside ASC, and thus may impact socio-emotional abilities. Whether it is autism, alexithymia, anxiety, or depression that is driving atypical emotion processing and gaze behaviour is the focus of this thesis. In a review of the literature, Chapter Two indicated that anxiety and depression are associated with some socio-emotional abilities in autism, but not all; however, there was a notable lack of research on the role of depression in autistic socioemotional abilities. Chapter Three demonstrated that neither autism or alexithymia, affected face processing. However, gender (specifically those identifying as neither male nor female) was significantly associated with emotion recognition, suggesting a potential link between gender diversity and emotion perception. Chapter Four indicated that face masks covering the mouth region hindered both emotion and identity recognition (more so emotion recognition) for both autistic and non-autistic participants, but that the autistic group was more affected by masks, suggesting that autistic people may draw more information from the mouth region when processing faces. Chapter Five found that autistic traits were associated with reduced gaze to the eye region of emotional face stimuli, and that alexithymia was associated with emotion recognition abilities. Anxiety and depression were not associated with face processing or gaze behaviour. Overall, the findings of this thesis indicate a connection between autism and gaze behaviour, and alexithymia and emotion recognition, but that these relationships are not consistent. Future research should focus on what other factors may be driving gaze and face processing, and which atypical socioemotional behaviours pattern with autism versus alexithymia.