A major component of children’s social competence is social interaction with peers.  Without peer interaction, children are lonely, which is associated with undesired isolation and negative feelings.  Children with autism, have a deficit in social interaction.  This major characteristic of autism ranges from having a lack of awareness of others (most severe) to abnormalities in peer relations (those less impaired).  It is known that high functioning children with autism fail to consider others’ perspectives and show a lack of reciprocity.  It is also known that when compared to children with mental retardation, children with autism engage in only one-third as many peer interactions.  Does this make autistic children lonely?  These researchers were interested in better understanding whether children with autism do not want to participate in peer interactions, or these children want to but do not know how to do so. 

This study examined spontaneous peer interaction in the school setting (during recess, etc.) of children with autism and examines these students’ sense of loneliness.  Eighteen high-functioning children with autism and 17 typical children were matched for IQ, age, gender, and maternal education. 

It was found that children with autism initiate many social interactions but spend only very small amounts of time interacting –compared to typical peers.  They choose to interact more often with typical peers than they do with other children in special education.  As with typical peers, most interactions are positive social behaviors.  Children with autism report higher degrees of loneliness than their typical peers.  Moreover, they are less likely than regular peers to appreciate the association between their own loneliness and their inability to have social interactions.   The authors suggest that intervention studies for these children might focus on enhancing their ability to interact with peers in a more complex communicative way and to make the link between their acquired social-emotional knowledge and their day-to-day social behavior with peers.

(Bauminger N et al; J Autism and Dev Disorders 2003; 33(5): 489-507)

Comment:  The authors feel there are promising programs out there for teaching high-functioning children with autism these social skills.  They steer their readers to worthwhile references.  The most recent of these is published in an earlier volume of J Autism and Dev Disorders (2003; 32:283-298) and authored by N. Bauminger.      – H. T.