Abstract
Background: Approximately 50,000 U.S. teens with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) become adults every year, however little is known regarding how age influences social cognition and if men and women with ASD are differentially impacted across the adult lifespan. Social cognition declines non-linearly with age in neurotypical (NT) adults. Moreover, sex differences have been observed on RME tasks in NT adults but not adults with ASD, although aging effects have been largely ignored.Objective: This cross-sectional study examined the influence of age and sex on social cognition in adults with ASD compared to NT adults.Methods: The Reading the Mind in the Eyes (RME) task was administered to evaluate the theory of mind abilities in 95 adults with ASD and 82 NT adults ages 18–71 years. The main effects of diagnosis, age, and sex, as well as two-way and three-way interaction were modeled using linear and quadratic aging terms in a multiple regression analysis.Results: A main effect of diagnosis was observed, indicating poorer performance in adults with ASD relative to NT adults. Age and sex interactions were nonsignificant.Discussion: We replicated previous findings of reduced theory of mind (ToM) abilities in adults with ASD, compared to NT adults. While interactions were nonsignificant, visual inspection of quadratic age curves indicated the possibility of unique ToM trajectories in men and women with and without ASD that should be investigated in larger longitudinal studies.
Highlights
Individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) face marked challenges in social and communicative functioning, including difficulties in understanding other people’s goals, intentions, and emotional states, known as the theory of mind (ToM; Baron-Cohen et al, 2015)
Deficits in social cognition have been reported in ASD across a variety of psychometrically-validated ToM tasks, including the Reading the Mind in the Eyes (RME) task which has been extensively examined in children and adolescents, and to lesser extent adults (Baron-Cohen et al, 2015; PeñuelasCalvo et al, 2019; Baksh et al, 2020)
These studies suggest pronounced social cognition difficulties related to ToM in ASD that persist into adulthood, potentially moderated by IQ
Summary
Individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) face marked challenges in social and communicative functioning, including difficulties in understanding other people’s goals, intentions, and emotional states, known as the theory of mind (ToM; Baron-Cohen et al, 2015). RME scores in adults with ASD inversely correlate with autism symptom severity and positively correlate with IQ on reading the mind in the voice task in ASD (Rutherford et al, 2002; Golan et al, 2007). Together, these studies suggest pronounced social cognition difficulties related to ToM in ASD that persist into adulthood, potentially moderated by IQ. 50,000 U.S teens with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) become adults every year, little is known regarding how age influences social cognition and if men and women with ASD are differentially impacted across the adult lifespan. Sex differences have been observed on RME tasks in NT adults but not adults with ASD, aging effects have been largely ignored
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