Autism was originally described as involving an apparent lack of motivation for social interaction. Social motivation has not figured prominently in subsequent theorizing regarding this disorder. Instead, theory of mind deficits have taken center stage as a theory of autism. This is surprising because evidence of social motivation deficits appear early, and might prove to be both specific to, and universal in, autism. The current study aimed to determine whether children with autism exhibit deficient social motivation in a ontrolled setting, and aimed to examine the relationship between social motivation and theory of mind competence. Fifteen 3-5-year-old children with autism (ASD) and 17 age-matched typically developing (TD) children participated. Measures of social motivation included: looks to experimenter during free play, forced choice between social and nonsocial interaction a) with a toy and b) to obtain a desired food item, and score on the Dimensions of Mastery Questionnaire. Measures of theory of mind competence included measures of imitation, joint attention, and understanding of desire, intentionality and false belief. All tasks required minimal language skills. The Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test - Fourth Edition (PPVT-IV) (Dunn & Dunn, 2007) and the Vineland Social-Emotional Early Childhood Scales (Sparrow, Balla, & Cicchetti,1998) were also administered. The ASD children looked at, and obtained food from an experimenter less frequently than did TD children. Parents reported that ASD children were less motivated to interact with others. ASD children were also impaired on the joint attention and understanding of desire tasks, but not on imitation, or understanding of intentionality or false belief. Few relations between performance on the social motivation and theory of mind tasks were detected. However, a significant correlation did emerge between social motivation and receptive language in the ASD group. In conclusion, the ASD group exhibited deficient social motivation. Evidence for impairments in theory of mind was less consistent, and was not tightly linked to impairments in social motivation. The current results highlight the promise of social motivation deficits in explaining symptoms of autism.

Last modified

• 09/12/2018

Creator

• Gwendolyn Mason Fiske

DOI

• https://doi.org/10.21985/N2VQ75

Subject

• Communication Sciences and Disorders - Learning Disabilities

Keyword

• social motivation
• treatment
• autism
• theory of mind
• social skills

Date created

• 2008-05-14

Resource type

• Dissertation

Rights statement

• In Copyright