Selective Attention and Emotion Self-Regulation Are Critical in Classroom Pro-Social Behavior

Background:

In a previous IMFAR poster we reported that a positive emotional state is an important determinant of pro-social classroom behavior in children with Asperger's Syndrome (AS) or High Functioning Autism (HFA). This finding, however, does not indicate: 1) how the emotional impact upon classroom behavior is mediated in cognitive terms; 2) what other factors supplement emotion as behavioral determinants; and 3) what influence specific autistic traits have on classroom behavior. Thus, our earlier finding (NIMH 1-R41-MH075162-01) provides only limited direction for formulating an intervention to optimize positive classroom behavior.

Objectives:

The objectives of the present study (NIMH 2-R42-MH075162-02) were twofold: 1) to replicate the previous findings regarding the impact of emotion on classroom behavior in a larger more diverse AS population and 2) to answer the questions listed above that emerged after our previous study.

Methods:

Participants were teens (13-19), diagnosed as AS/HFA, who had full scale IQs greater than 75 and attended a middle or high school inclusion program. The AS/HFA diagnosis was verified by the parent Social Responsiveness Survey (SRS). Teachers completed the BRIEF, which provides indices of attention and executive functioning. Trained observers reported emotional expression and social behavior in classroom settings. The in vivo measures of emotion were: happy/sad, peaceful/angry, interested/bored, calm/nervous, confident/overwhelmed, awake/sleepy, and “Engine Speed”. The in vivo social behavior measures were: cooperation with teachers, interaction with peers, self-expression, self-control, attention to instruction, social pragmatics during class discussion and inflexibility. During the five-week baseline period, the observers recorded these indices three times per week in three classes using Palm handheld computers and software from symtrend.com.

Results:

1) Classroom emotional status was strongly correlated with classroom social behavior, replicating previous results: r=0.81, p<0.0001). 2) The BRIEF's behavior regulation index – which reflects inhibitory and set shifting ability – was correlated with two in vivo measures of emotional expression: happy/sad (r=-0.40, p=0.02) and peaceful/angry (r=-0.40, p=0.02). It was also correlated with in vivo measures of classroom behavior: cooperation with teachers (r=-0.45, p=0.01) and self-control (r= -0.43, p=0.02). This pattern suggests how cognition mediates the emotional impact upon classroom social behavior: depressive emotion (sadness and anger) is an emotional burden from which students cannot effectively disengage (i.e., inhibit or shift away from). This disengagement failure diminishes cooperation and appropriate class engagement. 3) The BRIEF index of supervisory attention was correlated with certain aspects of classroom social behavior, but not with classroom emotional expression (the metacognition index was correlated with cooperation: r=-0.37, p=0.04; but not the average of classroom emotions: r=-0.24, p=0.20). This correlation pattern suggests that supervisory attention supplements the impact of emotional expression as a determinant of classroom social behavior. 4) The only AS trait that correlated with classroom social behavior was inflexibility – a symptom of diminished executive control (e.g., inflexibility – cooperation: r=0.58, p=0.003), continuing the theme of the previous findings.

Conclusions:

Our results suggest that interventions for improving classroom social behavior should focus on addressing regulation of emotions and supervisory attention/executive control as the route to improving classroom social behavior.