Emotions and music: the case of Autistic Spectrum disorders

Individuals with autistic spectrum disorders (ASD) exhibit a heightened interest in music (Levitin et al., 2004) and above average auditory processing abilities (Brown et al., 2003). Baron-Cohen and colleagues (2000) believe that hypo-functioning of the amygdala may explain the social and emotional deficits in autism such as a diminished sensitivity to fear. Happy and sad music can be identified as such by individuals with ASD (see Heaton et al., 1999) but their recognition of scary and peaceful music should be impaired, as observed in patients with damage to the amygdala (Gosselin et al., 2005). Thus, we asked 12 teenagers with ASD (Mean ± SD; age: 13years and 8 months ± 2 years and 4 months; VIQ: 90.33 ± 18.92; PIQ: 94.25 ± 17.76) and 14 typically developing (TD) teenagers (Mean ± SD; age: 14 years and 1 month ± 2 years and 1 month; VIQ: 119.78 ± 16.38; PIQ: 114.93 ± 11.99) to describe musical excerpts using one of the 4 following emotions: happy, sad, scared or peaceful. Musical knowledge and ability were measured by means of questionnaires (Salk and McGill Musical Inventory and Queen’s University Musical Inventory). An analysis of variance was carried out considering the intended emotion as a within-subject repeated measures variable (4 levels: happy, sad, scared, peaceful) and the diagnosis group as a between-subject variable (2 levels: ASD and TD). A diagnosis group effect was observed (F(1, 518) = 12.99, p .05). Thus, our results replicate Heaton and colleagues’ (1999) observations that individuals with ASD can identify happy and sad music. However, our results fail to support Baron-Cohen and colleagues’ (2000) amygdala theory of autism, which states that individuals with ASD exhibit impaired fear recognition. It is possible that music represents a specific domain where the amygdala theory of autism does not hold.