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Brief Report: Perception and Lateralization of Spoken Emotion by Youths with High-Functioning Forms of Autism

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Abstract

The perception and the cerebral lateralization of spoken emotions were investigated in children and adolescents with high-functioning forms of autism (HFFA), and age-matched typically developing controls (TDC). A dichotic listening task using nonsense passages was used to investigate the recognition of four emotions: happiness, sadness, anger, and neutrality. The participants with HFFA did not differ significantly in overall performance from the TDC, suggesting that the pervasive difficulty in processing emotions is not uniformly present in emotions expressed verbally. Both groups demonstrated a left-ear effect for the perception of emotion in nonsense passages, consistent with overall right-hemisphere superiority for this function.

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Acknowledgments

The authors appreciate the contributions of the children and families who participated in these research activities. Portions of this research were presented at the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association, Philadelphia, PA, November 2004.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Communication Sciences & Disorders, University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC, USA

    Kimberly F. Baker & Allen A. Montgomery

  2. Department of Neuropsychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, University of South Carolina School of Medicine, Columbia, SC, USA

    Ruth Abramson

  3. Department of Rehabilitation, Human Resources, & Communication Disorders, University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, AR, 72701, USA

    Kimberly F. Baker

Authors
  1. Kimberly F. Baker
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  2. Allen A. Montgomery
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  3. Ruth Abramson
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Kimberly F. Baker.

Appendix

Appendix

Four nonsense passages were produced. The nonsense passages, shown here in broad phonemtic transcription, were:

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Baker, K.F., Montgomery, A.A. & Abramson, R. Brief Report: Perception and Lateralization of Spoken Emotion by Youths with High-Functioning Forms of Autism. J Autism Dev Disord 40, 123–129 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-009-0841-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-009-0841-1

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