Implicit Attitudes Towards Adults with Autism: A Multi-Study Investigation

Background: Research examining attitudes towards individuals with autism has primarily relied on self-report measures that explicitly ask about attitudes and thus, may be subject to bias, particularly social desirability effects. Further, the majority of these studies have assessed perceptions of children rather than adults with autism. Given the increasing numbers of people with autism, it is important to develop a better understanding of attitudes towards adults with autism by their peers and other adults. Using measures of both explicit and implicit attitudes will provide a more comprehensive view of attitudes towards adults with autism.

Objectives: The goal of this research was to develop an Implicit Association Test (IAT) to assess implicit attitudes towards people with autism.

Methods: Participants in Study 1 were 175 college students (63 males; M_age = 19.15 years, 50.0% White). In Study 2, participants were 94 individuals (50 males; M_age = 31.3 years, 66.0% White) who were recruited through Amazon MTurk. There were 127 participants in Study 3 (75 males; M_age = 33.4 years) who were also recruited from Amazon MTurk. All participants completed a modified version of the IAT (Nosek et al., 2002) that we developed to assess attitudes towards autistic and neurotypical individuals. In Studies 1 and 2, the descriptors used in the IAT included positive and negative stereotypes that pre-test participants had identified as describing autistic and non-autistic adults. In Study 3, the words selected to describe autistic and non-autistic adults were descriptive rather than stereotypical (i.e., autistic, spectrum, non-autistic). Participants also completed two questionnaires that assessed explicit attitudes towards autism: the Autism Quotient questionnaire (Baron-Cohen et al., 2001), and the 16-item Societal Attitudes towards Autism Scale (Flood et al., 2013).

Results: University students (Study 1) and individuals from the general U.S. population (Studies 2 and 3) showed a negative implicit bias against their autistic peers, with students having the most bias, and the adults in Study 3 having the least bias. Across all studies, the fewer autistic behaviors participants reported, the more negative their implicit bias was against people with autism. The findings indicated that across all three studies, the responses to the explicit measures indicated positive attitudes towards individuals with autism. Further, the associations between the implicit and explicit measures were non-significant within each study.

Conclusions: Across three different samples from two different populations, the findings reveal that the participants have negative implicit attitudes towards persons with autism, although reporting positive explicit attitudes. The social desirability bias inherent in explicit measures is apparent in these findings. These results may provide insights concerning why individuals with autism report experiences of discrimination such as social exclusion, humiliation, and neglect (e.g., Peyton, 2004). Universities, workplaces, and other organizations may need explicit facilitation to make their environment more welcoming to adults with autism.