Compensation in autism is not consistent with social motivation theory
Open accessAbstract
Growing evidence, as presented by Jaswal & Akhtar, indicates that social motivation is not universally reduced in autism. Here, we evaluate and extend this argument in light of recent evidence of “compensation” in autism. We thereby argue that autistic “compensators” – exhibiting neurotypical behaviour despite persistent difficulties in social cognition – indicate intact or potentially heightened social motivation in autism.
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Reduced social involvement in some autistic people may be a consequence of exhaustion from camouflaging (emulating typical non-autistic interaction style), not necessarily lower social motivation.
“An important nuance to make here, is that although some autistic people show less involvement in social interaction, this might not necessarily be the result of lower social motivation, but rather it may be a consequence of exhaustion from trying to emulate a typical non-autistic style of interaction, known sometimes as camouflaging (e.g., Cook et al., 2021; Livingston et al., 2019).”
From Innovations of the ICD-11 in the Field of Autism Spectrum Disorder: A Psychological Approach (2022) · cites this paper as Livingston et al., 2019
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- Authors
- Livingston, L. A., Shah, P., & Happé, F.
- Affiliations
- King's College London (GB)
- University of Bath (GB)
- Venue
- Behavioral and Brain Sciences
- Publisher
- Cambridge University Press (CUP)
- Published
- 2019
- Volume
- 42
- ISSN
- 0140-525X (ISSN-L)
- 1469-1825
- OpenAlex
- W2963064544
- Cited by
- 30
- References
- 10
- Citations by year
- 2026: 4 · 2025: 1 · 2024: 4 · 2023: 6 · 2022: 3 · 2021: 8 · 2020: 2 · 2019: 2
- FWCI
- 2.18
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- Licence
- Locations
- Behavioral and Brain Sciences (publishedVersion)
- Pure (University of Bath) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
- ORCA Online Research @Cardiff (Cardiff University) (submittedVersion)
- Research Portal (King's College London) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Autism Spectrum Disorder Research
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Developmental and Educational Psychology › Child and Animal Learning Development
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Action Observation and Synchronization
- Keywords
- autism spectrum disorder, social motivation, compensation, social cognition, social motivation theory
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