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Brief Report: Risk-Aversion and Rationality in Autism Spectrum Disorders

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Abstract

Risk-aversion and rationality have both been highlighted as core features of decision making in individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD). This study tested whether risk-aversion is related to rational decision-making in ASD individuals. ASD and matched control adults completed a decision-making task that discriminated between the use of risk-averse and rational strategies. Results showed that overall, ASD participants were more risk-averse than control participants. Specifically, both groups made similar choices when risk-aversion was the less rational strategy but ASD participants chose more rational options than control participants when risk-aversion was the most rational strategy. This study confirmed that risk-aversion is a core feature of ASD and revealed that ASD individuals can switch their decision-making strategy adaptively to avoid negative consequences.

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Acknowledgments

We would like to express special thanks to Professor Tony Attwood for his helpful comments on a previous version of this manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Laboratory of Psychopathology and Health Process, Department of Psychology, Paris Descartes University, Boulogne-Billancourt, France

    Corentin J. Gosling & Sylvain Moutier

Authors
  1. Corentin J. Gosling
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  2. Sylvain Moutier
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Contributions

CJG and SM made substantial contributions to the conception, design, acquisition, analysis, and interpretation of the data.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Sylvain Moutier.

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Conflict of interest

All authors declare that they have no financial disclosures or competing interests.

Ethical Approval

The ethics committee of Paris Descartes University (CERES) approved this research involving human subjects (CERES No. 2016/14). In line with the declaration of Helskinski, all participants included in this research gave their written consent prior to their inclusion.

Electronic supplementary material

Below is the link to the electronic supplementary material.

10803_2018_3616_MOESM1_ESM.tif

Online Appendix—Example of a gain trial in the unequal expected value (EV) condition. First, participants received an initial sum of money to play the trial. Second, they were informed that they would not be able to keep the entire initial amount of money and would have to choose between a sure option (framed in terms of gain) and a risky option. In the gain frame of the unequal EV condition, the EV of the sure option (here, EVSure = 18€) was always inferior to the EV of the risky option (here, EVRisky = 20€) (TIF 2480 KB)

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Gosling, C.J., Moutier, S. Brief Report: Risk-Aversion and Rationality in Autism Spectrum Disorders. J Autism Dev Disord 48, 3623–3628 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-018-3616-8

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-018-3616-8

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