Infant Face Schema Processing In Children With Autism Spectrum Disorder:An Eye Movement Study

Infant schema can cause specific patterns of attention processing,behavioral and emotional responses.The infant face is the most typical infant schema,characterized by a large head,a high and protruding forehead,large low-set eyes,a short and narrow nose and a small chin.Individuals can quickly notice and automate the face of the infant,showing a preference response,and distinguish the face of the infant from the adult in a short period of time.Children with autism spectrum disorders(ASD)have face processing defects,such as eye avoidance,face cues processing defects and emotional recognition disorders.To investigate the schema processing of infant faces in ASD children,three experiments were designed.Study 1,to explore the characteristics of ASD children's attention to infants' faces and the pattern of eye movement processing under competitive conditions,eye movements of 15 ASD children and 15 typically developing(TD)children were recorded while passively viewing 8 pictures which combine a baby face with an adult face,the results showed that: similar to the TD children,ASD children have a infant schema perception,as well as they could distinguish between adult faces and infant faces,and attention bias to the infant faces.In study 2,18 ASD children and 18 TD children were asked to view 3 kinds of emotional faces of infants.It was found that children with ASD had significant attention preference for negative and positive infant faces under competitive condition.Study 3,18 ASD children and 18 TD children were asked to watch the infant faces under three cues conditions.The results showed that ASD children were less affected by the cues than the TD children,and showed avoidance of the part of eyes.In a word,ASD children have the ability of infant schema perception,and can promote their infant face processing,and the processing mode is consistent with the typically developing children.