“It's okay if you flap your hands”: Non-autistic children do not object to individual unconventional behaviors associated with autism

Abstract

Young children favor what they perceive as normative behavior and people who act in normative ways. This preference for normativity could negatively affect non-autistic children's attitudes towards autistic peers – individuals who (by definition) act in unconventional ways. In Study 1, we investigated how non-autistic 4- to 7-year-old U.S. children (N = 112) evaluated several unconventional behaviors characteristic of autism and the characters who engaged in them. Surprisingly, children generally did not object to individual autistic-like behaviors or the characters who engaged in them, although they evaluated them less favorably than normative behaviors and characters. In Study 2, we investigated why gaze aversion was the most negatively evaluated autistic-like behavior in Study 1. Six and seven-year-old U.S. children (N = 33) indicated that characters who averted their gaze as a teacher was talking were less attentive and less respectful than characters who looked at her as she was talking. Young children do not appear to object to individual autistic-like behaviors or peers who engage in them unless – as in the case of gaze aversion – they could signal a willful violation of classroom norms.