How Autistic Traits and Intolerance of Uncertainty Shape Literary Exploration

Curiosity often involves seeking extra information even when doing so is effortful or uncertain. This study examined how adults manage uncertainty when choosing what to read, and how these choices relate to autistic traits (AT) and intolerance of uncertainty (IU). Curiosity was operationalised as a two-stage behavioural process: first, whether people chose to explore at all, and second, how they allocated limited “exploration credits” to more versus less ambiguous text. Eighty-three English-speaking adults completed an online within-participant reading task. On each trial, they saw a brief literary passage (more ambiguous, interpretive) and an expository passage (more concrete, informational) side-by-side. Participants received four “credits” per trial and could spend these to reveal more of either passage before giving 1–7 ratings of interest and confusion for each. AT and IU were assessed as continuous traits, and mixed-effects models tested links between these traits and engagement, allocation, and ratings. The results showed that participants generally chose to engage, and there was no clear evidence that higher AT, IU, or their interaction reduced the likelihood of spending any credits. By contrast, allocation showed a modest AT × IU interaction: when both traits were higher, participants tended to allocate proportionally more credits to expository texts, withonly small and imprecise trait effects. Confusion ratings were higher for literary than expository passages, confirming the ambiguity manipulation, and there was some evidence that this gap widened at higher AT. Overall, the findings suggest that AT and IU do not switch curiosity off, but can subtly steer where curiosity is expressed under ambiguity and cost.