Effect of a Pragmatic Language Intervention on Facial Expression Recognition in Youth with Autism Spectrum Disorder

Pragmatic language impairments, such as difficulty in effectively using socio-emotional contextual cues to comprehend a speaker's meaning and feelings, are a hallmark characteristic of autism spectrum disorders (ASD). One area of pragmatic language specifically impacted by ASD is the ability to recognize emotions, particularly as they are communicated through facial expressions. To date, current research investigating the ability of children with ASD to recognize emotions from facial expressions is lacking in that most research: (a) pertains to those with moderate to severe ASD, disregarding those with mild ASD, (b) investigates the ability of individuals with mild ASD to recognize basic emotions as opposed to equally important complex emotions, and (c) does not provide proven effective interventions that aim to increase emotion recognition deficits in individuals with mild ASD. This is unfortunate, as individuals with mild ASD typically posses a greater awareness of their pragmatic language deficits and desire to improve them (DeRosier, et al. 2010; Myles & Simpson, 2002). This is a characteristic that distinguishes individuals mildly impacted by ASD from the majority of their moderate-severe ASD peers, and which further serves to illuminate the need for effective interventions aimed at this population.;The present study aimed to address emotion recognition deficits by examining the effectiveness of the emotion recognition intervention (ERI) treatment in increasing the ability to recognize complex emotions from facial expressions in children with AS and HFA. Participants included five children (4 males, 1 female) ranging in age from 8--11 years. The ERI treatment consisted of four stages: (1a) identification of features presented in isolation; (1b) identification of features presented in combination; (2) identification via pictures; (3) identification via still images; (4) identification via video clips. Findings suggest that the ERI treatment is an effective tool to increase, maintain, and generalize emotion recognition skills for children presenting with symptomatology consistent with AS and HFA. While results indicate that treatment may be most effective for individuals with AS, findings also suggest that with adaptation, the ERI treatment might prove equally beneficial to children with HFA.;Keywords: autism spectrum disorder, complex emotions.