LONG-TERM STABILITY OF INDIVIDUAL-DIFFERENCES IN THE EMOTIONAL RESPONSIVENESS OF CHILDREN WITH AUTISM

The results of two studies designed to investigate the short- and long -term stability of autistic children's responsiveness to displays of n egative emotions in others are reported here. In the first study we me asured the attention and behavioural responses of 22 autistic children to another's distress about a year and a half after initial assessmen ts in a similar situation. In the second study, the children were re-a ssessed in two affective contexts over 5 years after initial testing. Individual differences in early responses to affect predicted affectiv e responsiveness at each follow-up. Emotional responsiveness was posit ively associated with concurrent cognitive skills at each point of ass essment. Furthermore, autistic children discriminated between affectiv e and non-affective contexts when this discrimination was tested at th e second follow-up. Copyright (C) 1996 Association for Child Psycholog y and Psychiatry.