Evidence of Intact or Excessive EE in Autism--论文代写范文精选

然而,对于自闭症儿童，与研究者的预测是相一致的。假设移情范式集中表现在面部表情或努。然而,自闭症儿童比正常儿童更少的情感共鸣。下面的essay代写范文继续阐述。

Introduction
Perhaps the earliest evidence of high EE sensitivity in autism comes from a laboratory study by Capps, Kasari, Yirmiya, and Sigman (1993). Capps et al. analyzed the facial affect of children with high-functioning autism while the participants watched “videotaped vignettes designed to elicit empathy” (p. 477). Each vignette featured a child protagonist experiencing happiness, pride, sadness, fear, or anger. The 16 participants with autism (mean age = 146 months) were compared with 19 typically developing children. Capps et al. hypothesized that the children with autism would display less positive affect than the comparison children. In fact, they found that the children with autism showed considerably more positive affect than the comparison children. While viewing the vignettes, the children with autism also showed significantly more concentration than the comparison children. The emotional responses of the children with autism were found to be appropriate to the situation of the protagonist in the vignettes. The children with autism displayed concentration or neutrality but minimal positive or negative affect while viewing the vignettes that featured negative emotion.（essay代写)

These results seem consistent with the EIH of autism. In contrast to the researchers’ prediction, the children with autism in this study appeared to display significantly more EE than the typically developing children. However, the increased display of concentration in the children with autism was consistent with the researchers’ predictions. Capps et al. (1993) had hypothesized that “the empathy paradigm would be more taxing for autistic than for normal children and that this would be manifested in facial expression of concentration or effort” (p. 477). Yet the paradigm was not so taxing that the children with autism were less emotionally empathic than the typically developing children. It is possible that the amount of concentration reflected the intensity of the empathic connections. 

The data also seem consistent with the hypothesis that people with autism may be more willing to empathize with happy people than with distressed people. Capps et al. concluded that “autistic subjects’ facial expressiveness suggests that they do respond to others’ emotions, yet they may have difficulty appropriating this response” (p. 482). Compelling evidence of an EE surfeit in autism also comes from a recent study of automatic mimicry of facial expressions. Magnee, de Gelder, van Engeland, and Kemner (2007) used facial electromyography to measure subtle emotional responses in 13 young men with high-functioning autism or Asperger syndrome and 13 controls (healthy men matched for age and IQ). 

The participants were presented with pictures of happy and fearful faces and instructed to judge the sex of each face. The researchers were surprised to find that the participants with autism spectrum disorders showed significantly heightened electromyographic responsiveness both to happy and to fearful faces. This result contrasts with a previous study that found deficits in automatic mimicry of emotional expressions in autism (McIntosh, ReichmannDecker, Winkielman, & Wilbarger, 2006). Magnee et al. (2007) suggested that the crucial difference between the two studies was that McIntosh et al. did not set their participants an active task requiring careful attention to the faces. McIntosh et al. simply instructed their participants to “watch the pictures as they appear on the screen” (p. 297). 

There is evidence that rapid facial reactions measured by electromyography are genuinely emotional phenomena (Moody, McIntosh, Mann, & Weisser, 2007) and correlate with self-reported EE (Sonnby-Borgstrom, 2002). The data presented by McIntosh et al. (2006) are consistent with the hypothesis that people with autism may not actively attend to emotional expressions in order to minimize empathic arousal. However, the data presented by Magnee et al. (2007) provide evidence that the underlying capacity for EE in autism is not just intact but excessive. Another way to study EE sensitivity is to measure electrodermal responses to relevant stimuli. Blair (1999) found that children with autism showed appropriate psychophysiological responses to images of distressed people.

Importantly for the EIH, “two of the children with autism tested placed their hands in front of their eyes when a distress cue picture was presented to them and refused to look at it” (p. 483). Clearly, people with autism are sometimes reluctant to attend to emotional expressions, and it is unlikely that people with low EE sensitivity would find images of distress so aversive. EE facilitates moral development (e.g., Hoffman, 2000), and there is evidence that children with autism can distinguish between moral and conventional rules: They appear to understand that it is unacceptable to disregard rules that prevent human suffering but potentially acceptable to disregard rules that are merely conventions (Blair, 1996; see also Grant, Boucher, Riggs, & Grayson, 2005). 

This ability arguably indicates a significant degree of EE sensitivity in people with autism. That people with autism often feel contrite about inadvertently upsetting other people (e.g., see Baron-Cohen & Wheelwright, 2004) is also consistent with the EIH. Questionnaires can be used to probe empathy in people with highfunctioning autism. Rogers, Dziobek, Hassenstab, Wolf, and Convit (2007) asked 21 adults with Asperger syndrome and 21 matched controls to complete the Interpersonal Reactivity Index. This instrument includes items designed to tap empathic concern and items designed to tap personal distress. The two groups of participants scored similarly for empathic concern, but the participants with Asperger syndrome scored significantly higher than the controls on the personal distress scale. The latter result indicates that people with Asperger syndrome may be particularly susceptible to empathic overarousal. Indeed, Rogers et al. acknowledged that their findings could be interpreted as evidence of greater empathy in the participants with Asperger syndrome. 

The researchers also pointed out that people with the syndrome have a general tendency to be anxious and that this may contribute to personal distress. These two interpretations are not mutually exclusive if empathic imbalance is a cause of anxiety in autism. If the EIH is correct, then the emotional status of other people can be expected to influence the behavior of children with autism. Indeed, displaying positive emotion in consistent and predictable ways could be one of the most therapeutic techniques that caregivers might employ. It might reduce the frequency of avoidant, stereotypic, or challenging behavior in people with autism. A preliminary study (Merges, 2003) of 3 children with autism provided evidence that this may be the case. Merges exposed the children to two emotional contagion conditions (a positive emotion condition and a neutral emotion condition). The children engaged in fewer challenging behaviors during the positive emotion contagion condition. Merges concluded that children with autism may be directly impacted by the emotions of those around them. This study may merit replication with the addition of a control group of nonautistic children who exhibit challenging behavior.

Narratives of Practitioners, Caregivers, and People With Autism
A number of autistic narratives allude to excessive EE and complement the empirical literature. Caldwell (2006), an experienced autism practitioner, has independently proposed an idea that is similar to the EIH. She has argued that many people with autism are sensitive to the emotions of others to a painful and excessive degree. She suggested that people with autism thus learn to suppress their EE. Otter and Masefield (2001), drawing on their experience as specialist teachers with an interest in Facilitated Communication, observed that “some people with autism seem to be highly sensitive to non-verbal signals of mood and intention, even though they may not always know . . . how to respond appropriately to them” (p. 172). （essay代写)

They portrayed individuals with autism as confused about the facilitator’s mental states but nevertheless as sensitive to the facilitator’s “vibes.” Hughes (2003) wrote about his son with autism, Walker. According to Hughes, Walker’s “supersensitive emotional barometer registered the true emotional pressure in the air, no matter how hard we tried to mask it” (p. 130). The grandmother of a boy with autism named Julian perceived her grandson as “a sensitive child with his own quirks and oddities that he was entitled to, picking up negative and positive vibrations around him like most children, only in his case more so” (Wheatley, 2005, p. 30). Kaufman (1994) noted that his son with autism “seemed almost telepathic in his ability to detect the discomforts and moods of those around him” and that he “moved away from people who appeared distressed by his actions” (p. 81). Kaufman suggested that it is therapeutic for children with autism if caregivers can change their emotional attitude toward autistic behavior from one of distress to one of acceptance.（essay代写)

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