Social Interaction Style in Autism: A critical review of social behaviours and outcomes in autistic and neurotypical interactions

Social interaction difficulties are a defining feature of autism. Historically, researchhas concentrated on comparing the social behaviours of autistic and neurotypicalindividuals in cross-neurotype dyads, often attributing challenges in communicationto autistic social deficits. However, recent studies on interactions between two autisticindividuals provide new insights, suggesting that some social difficulties may at leastpartially arise from mutual misunderstandings. This critical review analyses twenty-three studies on autistic, mixed, and neurotypical interactions, highlighting consistentdifferences (e.g., reduced mutual gaze and backchanneling in autistic interactions)and similarities between autistic and neurotypical social interactions (e.g., turn-taking), as well as measurements yielding mixed results (e.g., social motor synchrony).We discuss the variability in social behaviours, outcomes, and study designs in theexisting literature and interpret the existing findings in the light of individual deficitsand relational difficulties. We emphasise the need for future research to consider bothsame- and mixed-neurotype interactions and to include perspectives from bothneurotypical and autistic individuals to enhance our understanding of socialinteraction in autism.