Cognitive 1: Baren-Cohen

Question 0

What were the IVs and DVs?

Answer 0

IV:

• PPs gender/condition
• type of gender/emotion in photo

DV: test score out of 25

Question 1

What was the aim?

Answer 1

To provide support for a cognitive explanation of autism, specifically that autistic adults lack advanced theory of mind skills.
Also whether within the normal population, females would be significantly better than males.

Question 2

Who were the PPs?

Answer 2

Group 1: 16 (4HFA, 12AS), 13m 3f mean 26.6 years
•variety of clinical sources
•advert in National Autistic Society magazine ‘communication’ (volunteer)

Group 2: 50 normal adults, 25m 25f, mean 30 years
•randomly from population of Cambridge- excluding UNI students

Group 3: 10 Tourettes, 8m 2f, mean age 27.77 years
•tertiary referral clinic London
•volunteer/self selecting

Question 3

What was the procedure?

Answer 3

1. IQ test to check for normal IQ
2. Photo shown for 3 seconds
3. PPs choose between 2 emotions that were antithesis
4. 25 questions
5. Strange stories task= given a short story and then asked about the mental/physical state of a character

Question 4

What was the background?

Answer 4

• Previous Baren-Cohen investigation suggested that HFA/AS adults could pass the Sally-Anne test (test involving dolls where Anne moves Sally’s marbles and asked where Sally will now look)
• Wanted to develop a more advanced theory of mind test

Question 5

What were the results?

Answer 5

AS/HFA= 16.3/25
Normal= 20.3/25
Tourette= 20.4/25
Normal males= 18.8
Normal females= 21.8

• AS/HFA adults were also impaired on a simple theory of mind test like kids
• No correlation between IQ+test score
• Normal females significantly better

Question 6

What are some evaluations (pros+cons)?

Answer 6

• Lab= low Eco v
• 25 questions= order effects

✔️tested Tourette’s= ensures was a cause of disorder+not eye contact
✔️2 tests (eyes and stories)= concurrent validity

Question 7

What are some possible improvements?

Answer 7

• more than 2 possible answers and not opposites= more advanced+less guessing (higher validity)
• show video of an emotion= higher Eco v as analysing body language and facial expressions
• stratified sample= more range of ages

Question 8

What were some controls?

Answer 8

• Tourette= definitely conditions (HFA/AS) and not eye contact
• Asked to determine gender of eyes= eliminates general deficits in face or social perception
• Basic emotion recognition= shown 6 photos of whole faces and asked to determine emotion (happy, sad, angry, surprised, afraid, disgusted) to eliminate deficits of basic emotion recognition