The processing of facial actions in deaf children with autism who use British Sign Language (BSL)

Abstract

A key characteristic of children with autism relates to their understanding of other people and  their intentions. They often have difficulties with many aspects of facial processing, including interpreting and producing facial expressions – of emotion, intention, and communication. Sign languages of deaf people require the fluent use of non-manual markers (NMMs) on the face, and deaf children look at and produce facial actions when communicating. The question posed in this work is: How does the requirement to observe facial actions for communication, including NMMs, affect deaf children with autism, compared with deaf children who use a sign language (BSL) but who do not have autism? The experiments summarized here show some differences, with poorer comprehension and production of expressions related to emotions and mental states in sign language for deaf children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). However, other NMMs involving the face, including some deemed to be linguistic, were relatively preserved in this group. Overall, deaf children with autism were not impaired in the production or perception of many facial actions while using sign language, when compared with  deaf children of similar intellectual range and sign language ability. One explanation is that deafness may mitigate this aspect of autism, bestowing better ability with faces due to the requirement to attend to the face when communicating visually.