Mutual (Mis)Understanding: Inferring Thoughts by and of Individuals With and Without Autism

While prevailing theories suggest social interaction difficulties are inherent to autism, the theory of the double empathy problem (DEP) proposes these difficulties arise from a mismatch between different neurotypes. The theory predicts more challenging communication between individuals with and without autism, but better communication among individuals with autism. While individuals with autism indeed report better communication, experimental studies testing the theory are largely lacking. In this study, 106 adults (55 with autism) completed an empathic accuracy task in which they watched video clips of an interaction between an individual with and without autism and inferred the individuals’ thoughts. Contrary to our hypothesis, adults with autism were not better at estimating the thoughts of other adults with autism. Instead, they were generally less accurate than adults without autism. Individuals with autism were also perceived as more difficult to estimate. In conclusion, this study did not find support for the DEP theory. Further research is needed to understand the reported ease of communication among individuals with autism.