Difficulties regulating emotions have been coined as inherent to autism, possibly even presenting a core difficulty of autism. While several models of emotion regulation have been proposed in the past, in this targeted review article, we aim to map emotion regulation difficulties in autistic individuals within the framework of the extended process…

The use of emotion recognition technologies in the workplace is expanding. These technologies claim to provide insights into internal emotional states based on external cues like facial expressions. Despite interconnections between autism and the development of emotion recognition technologies as reported in prior research, little attention has…

Fatigue is associated with numerous harmful physical and mental health outcomes. Despite the established relationship between sleep and fatigue, research examining sleep variability within a person (i.e. intraindividual variability; IIV) and fatigue is limited. In addition, the associations between child and parent sleep regarding parent fatigue…

Autistic youth often experience challenges in interactions with neurotypical peers. One factor that may influence successful interactions with peers is interpersonal synchrony, or the degree to which interacting individuals align their behaviors (e.g. facial expressions) over time. Autistic and neurotypical youth were paired together into three…

To better understand the associations between social activities and depressive symptoms in adolescents and young adults with autism spectrum disorder, this study utilized interpersonal theories of depression by accounting for both frequency of various social activities and perceptions of how well their time spent in these activities meet their…

Knowledge of autistic individuals' experiences of self-compassion is very limited. This study investigated autistic women's experiences of self-compassion after receiving their diagnosis in adulthood. Eleven autistic women completed semi-structured interviews analysed using interpretative phenomenological analysis. Three super-ordinate themes were…

Qualitative literature reports the sensory experiences of autistic individuals in the first person. Following a thematic synthesis procedure, this metasynthesis aimed to explore specifically the lived experience of these sensory features. Four databases were systematically searched for qualitative studies describing sensory issues reported by…

The COVID-19 pandemic caused significant health distress among autistic adults in the United States. While there is considerable evidence that autistic adults' COVID-19 health distress was related to increases in mental health concerns (e.g. depression, anxiety, and stress), there is a less clear understanding of the possible mechanisms by which…

Autistic people experience high rates of mental health problems. A tendency towards behavioural repetition in autistic individuals could contribute to repetitive negative thinking, which is a transdiagnostic risk factor for mental health problems. Our research aimed to add to the literature by using transdiagnostic measures of both mental health…

In the past 40 years, accumulating evidence suggested that autistic individuals are at an increased risk of suicidal thoughts and behaviors. This study examined the occurrence of various potential risk factors for lifetime suicidal behavior and suicidal thoughts in the past month in a Dutch cohort (Netherlands Autism Register) of autistic…

Autistic children are often reported less socially connected, while recent studies show autistic children experiencing more loneliness in school than allistic (i.e. non-autistic) children, contradicting the traditional view that autistic children lack social motivation. This study aimed to understand individual differences in how social…

Shared family meals are associated with family functioning and thought to protect against disordered eating in families with neurotypical children. Limited research, however, has examined the mealtime structure or experience in families with children with autism (Autism spectrum condition) and/or attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, despite…

Autism spectrum disorder is a neurodevelopmental condition characterized by social communication difficulties and restricted, repetitive behaviors. Autism spectrum disorder is highly co-morbid with other neuro-psychiatric disorders such as attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, anxiety, and depression. However, research on post-traumatic stress…

Differences in (autism) characteristics are often reported between autistic and non-autistic adults but also between autistic adults. We aimed to determine whether mean differences correspond to differences in network structure of these characteristics in (1) autistic and non-autistic adults and (2) two previously identified autism subgroups. A…

With the widespread use of masks in the COVID-19 pandemic, it is crucial to understand how emotion recognition is affected by partial face covering. Since individuals with autism spectrum condition often tend to look at the lower half of the face, they are likely to be particularly restricted in emotion recognition by people wearing masks, since…