Expression, perception and understanding of emotions in autism: Psychological and neurobiological findings

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to review studies investigating emotional devel­opment in autism. The paper is organized in three parts. First, studies are reviewed suggesting that autistic children have profound difficulty in the ability to express emotions and to perceive the emotional expressions in the faces of others. Next, studies are discussed which show that autistic chil­dren compared to typically developing children have difficulties in the expression and understanding of "complex" emotions (shame, guilt, embar­rassment, etc). Finally, studies are presented supporting a connection between the emotional deficit and structural and functional abnormalities of the amygdala in the autistic brain.