J Korean Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry.  2018 Oct;29(4):150-160. 10.5765/jkacap.180010.

Discriminative Effects of Social Skills Training on Facial Emotion Recognition among Children with Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder and Autism Spectrum Disorder

• Lee JS
• Kang NR
• Kim HJ
• Kwak YS

• KMID: 2436273
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.5765/jkacap.180010

Abstract

OBJECTIVES
This study investigated the effect of social skills training (SST) on facial emotion recognition and discrimination in children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and autism spectrum disorder (ASD).
METHODS
Twenty-three children aged 7 to 10 years participated in our SST. They included 15 children diagnosed with ADHD and 8 with ASD. The participants' parents completed the Korean version of the Child Behavior Checklist (K-CBCL), the ADHD Rating Scale, and Conner's Scale at baseline and post-treatment. The participants completed the Korean Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children-IV (K-WISC-IV) and the Advanced Test of Attention at baseline and the Penn Emotion Recognition and Discrimination Task at baseline and post-treatment.
RESULTS
No significant changes in facial emotion recognition and discrimination occurred in either group before and after SST. However, when controlling for the processing speed of K-WISC and the social subscale of K-CBCL, the ADHD group showed more improvement in total (p=0.049), female (p=0.039), sad (p=0.002), mild (p=0.015), female extreme (p=0.005), male mild (p=0.038), and Caucasian (p=0.004) facial expressions than did the ASD group.
CONCLUSION
SST improved facial expression recognition for children with ADHD more effectively than it did for children with ASD, in whom additional training to help emotion recognition and discrimination is needed.

Keyword

Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder; Autism spectrum disorder; Social skills training; Facial recognition

MeSH Terms

Autism Spectrum Disorder*
Autistic Disorder*
Checklist
Child Behavior
Child*
Discrimination (Psychology)
Facial Expression
Facial Recognition
Female
Humans
Intelligence
Male
Parents
Social Skills*