Moderating effect of autistic traits on the relationship between peripheral visual processing and facial emotion recognition

Distinct visual processing patterns are one of the underlying mechanisms of atypical facial emotion recognition in individuals with autism spectrum disorder. However, the role of peripheral visual processing, particularly the functional field of view (FFOV), remains unclear. Therefore, this study aimed to examine the relationships among autistic traits, FFOV size, and facial emotion recognition ability. Seventy-five students completed the Autism-Spectrum Quotient (AQ) and then performed facial emotion recognition and FFOV tasks. In the emotion recognition task, participants viewed one of five facial expressions (anger, disgust, fear, happiness, or sadness) on a monitor and selected the word that best described the expression. The FFOV task followed a similar procedure, except that the target digit was presented in the peripheral vision immediately after the facial images disappeared. FFOV size was estimated by fitting psychometric functions to the identification performance of the digits as a function of the target eccentricity. The major findings were: (a) AQ scores did not predict FFOV size, (b) FFOV size was positively correlated with the accuracy of facial emotion recognition, and (c) this correlation became non-significant with lower AQ scores. The findings suggest that peripheral visual processing is associated with facial emotion recognition ability, and that this association varies as a function of autistic traits.