Efficacy of a Facial Expression Recognition Training Software for Taiwanese School-Aged Children with Asperger's Disorder

Background: Asperger‘s disorder is characterized by the notable difficulties in social interactions. Previous researches have suggested that such impairment in social interactions is probably due to some deficits in their theory of mind. There have been various methods and materials developed internationally for training the theory of mind. Among them, some are computer software specially designed for improving facial expression recognition ability.

Objectives: To evaluate the applicability and effect of a software designed for children with Asperger‘s disorder to improve their ability to recognize human facial expression.

Methods: Nine Taiwanese boys with Asperger‘s disorder (aged 9 to 12) received the facial expression recognition training. A pre- and post-test design was used to compare the performance of the participants on various outcome measures including: (1) Facial Expression Recognition Task built in the training software; (2) Diagnostic Analysis of Non-Verbal Accuracy II-Taiwan Version (DANVA 2-TW); (3) Children‘s version of the Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test (Eyes Test); (4) Advanced Theory of Mind Test (ToM Test). Each participant‘s data were presented individually for direct comparison and the Wilcoxon signed-rank tests were used for group analysis.  

Results: The results showed that this training software can partially improve the ability of facial expression recognition for the participants. There were significant improvements in the accuracy of the Facial Expression Recognition Task after the training. However, no significant pre-post differences were found in the participant’s performance on the DANVA 2-TW, Eyes Test, and ToM Test.

Conclusions: The computer assisted training software used in our study is applicable for children with Asperger‘s disorder to improve their ability to recognize facial expression during the training. Despite its convenience, cost-effective, and immediate effect at the time of training, however, the training effect failed to generalize to other tasks. Thus, it is suggested that it might be useful to include training software as an adjunct in a comprehensive multi-component training programs, but not use such a tool as an intervention alone. Future studies are needed to develop more effective software.