Features discrimination in real vs. cartoon faces: Do children with autism make the difference?

Background:

It is now widely accepted that atypical face processing is a hallmark feature of autistic spectrum disorders (ASD). However, recent studies suggest that atypical face processing in children with ASD, though present for human real faces, does not extend to cartoon faces, that can be considered as less socially relevant stimuli (e.g., Rosset et al., in press).

Objectives:

The aim of the present study was to determine whether facial perceptual skills in children with ASD differ as a function of the social nature of a face. To this aim, children with ASD were presented with a facial features-discrimination task including pictures of real and cartoon faces, and their performance was compared to that of typically developing controls.

Methods:

17 high-functioning children with ASD and 17 chronological matched controls were presented with 96 pairs of real or cartoon faces. Half of pairs was composed of two identical faces (Same trials), while the remaining pairs included faces differing in terms of the eyes’ or the mouth’s brightness level (Different trials). Each pair of faces was displayed either upright or inverted. Children were asked to decide whether the two faces of each pair were same or different.

Results:

For controls, a higher performance on upright than inverted trials was found for real but not for cartoon faces. By contrast, children with ASD showed higher performance on upright than inverted trials for both types of faces.

Conclusions:

Contrary to typically developing children, children with ASD fail to show processing differences between real and cartoon faces. Results of this study provide further support to the idea that human faces do not have a special status for children with ASD.