Abnormal Psychology

Childhood Disorders 639

discovery that in 2005 more children had autism in counties of the Northwest states

(California, Oregon, and Washington) that had more days of rain from 1987 to

2001. The researchers conjectured that bad weather may lead children to spend

more time indoors, possibly increasing their television viewing, their risk for a vita-

min D defi ciency, or their exposure to household cleaning products.

Like autism, Asperger’s disorder appears to have a genetic basis: Compared to

the general population, relatives of someone with Asperger’s are more likely to have

an autism spectrum disorder (Cederlund & Gillberg, 2004).

Psychological Factors: Cognitive Defi cits

Neurological factors give rise to psychological symptoms, particularly cognitive def-

icits in shifting attention and in mental fl exiblilty (Ozonoff & Jensen, 1999). These

defi cits underlie the extreme diffi culty in transitioning from one activity to another

that individuals with autism spectrum disorders experience; people with autism also

tend to focus on details at the expense of the broader picture (Frith, 2003). However,

these defi cits are not part of the DSM-IV-TR diagnostic criteria.

Another problem—also not noted in the DSM-IV-TR criteria—is diffi culty in

recognizing facial expressions of emotions (Serra et al., 2003). For example, in one

study 3- and 4-year-olds’ brain activity was assessed with EEG while they were

shown photographs of faces that either expressed fear or had neutral expressions.

Normal children exhibited greater brain activity in response to the fear expressions

than to the neutral expressions. But children with autism responded to both types of

facial expressions with the same pattern of brain activity (Dawson et al., 2004).

People with autism also have diffi culty viewing the world from another per-

son’s perspective—with using a theory of mind, which is a theory about other

people’s mental states (their beliefs, desires, and feelings) that allows each of us to

predict how others will react in a given situation (Tager-Flusberg, 1999). Because

a theory of mind requires thinking about somebody else, by defi nition, this ability

involves both psychological and social factors. An impaired theory of mind is dem-

onstrated with the false belief test (Baron-Cohen, Leslie, & Frith, 1985), which

requires that the participant keep in mind the point of view of someone else: Two

dolls, Sally and Anne, are used to act out a scene. Sally puts a marble in a basket

and then leaves the room without taking the basket. Anne then quietly moves

the marble from the basket into a box. The child is then asked to say where Sally

will look for the marble when she comes back in the room. The correct answer,

that Sally will look in the basket, requires the participant to appreciate the point

of view of Sally, who does not know that the marble was moved. In this study,

80% of the children with autism answered incorrectly that Sally would look in

the box. These children were not able to override what they knew and take Sally’s

perspective. Although some individuals with milder symptoms of autism may be

able to answer correctly on the false belief test, they are not able to do so when

the task involves more complex processing of social cues, such as understanding

white lies or irony (Happé, 1994).

People with Asperger’s disorder also have an impaired theory of mind. How-

ever, these problems are less severe than in people with autism (Ziatas, Durkin, &

Pratt, 2003). In addition, even the normal siblings of individuals with Asperger’s

have an impaired theory of mind (Dorris et al., 2004), which provides further sup-

port for the inference that genes play a role in this disorder.

Social Factors: Communication Problems

The earliest indications of autism arise in interactions with other people: Children

with autism pay attention to other people’s mouths, not their eyes (Dawson, Webb, &

McPartland, 2005) and don’t respond to their own name or to parents’ voices

(Baranek, 1999). Moreover, they don’t develop normal communication skills—

verbal or nonverbal. As they get older, they don’t develop the typical ability to

recognize faces, and they also have problems recognizing emotion, both in voices

(Rutherford, Baron-Cohen, & Wheelwright, 2002) and in facial expressions (Bölte &

Poustka, 2003). These cognitive defi cits make social interactions confusing and

unpredictable.

Theory of mind

A theory about other people’s mental states

(their beliefs, desires, and feelings) that

allows a person to predict how other people

will react in a given situation.

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