ArticleScientific reports2016
Divergent roles of autistic and alexithymic traits in utilitarian moral judgments in adults with autism.
Article in Scientific reports, 2016. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 28 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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Who cites it
28 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Emotional self-awareness in autism: A meta-analysis of group differences and developmental effects.Autism : the international journal of research and practice · 2021Pooled it
- Moral Decision-Making, Machiavellianism, and Social Cognition in Autism: An Exploratory Study.Journal of autism and developmental disorders · 2026Article
- Narrative discourse comprehension in Greek-speaking children with autism spectrum disorder: evidence from Aesop's fables.Frontiers in psychology · 2026Article
- Beyond Trolleyology: The CNI Model of Moral-Dilemma Responses.Personality and social psychology review : an official journal of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology, Inc · 2025Review
- Moral foundations in autistic people and people with systemizing minds.Molecular autism · 2024Article
- Development of Moral Judgments in Impersonal and Personal Dilemmas in Autistic Spectrum Disorders from Childhood to Late Adolescence.Journal of autism and developmental disorders · 2024Article
- Family and job microsystems as mediators between social integration and depression among rural-to-urban migrant workers in China: does having sons make a difference?Frontiers in public health · 2024Article
- Alexithymia in Adult Autism Clinic Service-Users: Relationships with Sensory Processing Differences and Mental Health.Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland) · 2023Article
- Disgust Processing and Potential Relationships with Behaviors in Autism.Current psychiatry reports · 2023Review
- Emotional descriptions increase accidental harm punishment and its cortico-limbic signatures during moral judgment in autism.Scientific reports · 2023Article
- Effects of Alexithymia on Moral Decision-Making in Sacrificial Dilemmas: High Alexithymia is Associated with Weaker Sensitivity to Moral Norms.Psychology research and behavior management · 2023Article
- Effect of subclinical depression on moral judgment dilemmas: a process dissociation approach.Scientific reports · 2022Article
- Theory of Mind and Moral Decision-Making in the Context of Autism Spectrum Disorder.Journal of autism and developmental disorders · 2022Article
- Self-Conscious Emotion Processing in Autistic Adolescents: Over-Reliance on Learned Social Rules During Tasks with Heightened Perspective-Taking Demands May Serve as Compensatory Strategy for Less Reflexive Mentalizing.Journal of autism and developmental disorders · 2021Article
- Morality of the Heart: Heart Rate Variability and Moral Rule Adherence in Men.Frontiers in neuroscience · 2021Article
- Moral Foundations Theory Among Autistic and Neurotypical Children.Frontiers in psychology · 2021Article
- Do Individuals With Autism Spectrum Disorders Help Other People With Autism Spectrum Disorders? An Investigation of Empathy and Helping Motivation in Adults With Autism Spectrum Disorder.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2019Article
- Cognitive-Emotional and Inhibitory Deficits as a Window to Moral Decision-Making Difficulties Related to Exposure to Violence.Frontiers in psychology · 2019Review
- Visual Encoding of Social Cues Contributes to Moral Reasoning in Autism Spectrum Disorder: An Eye-Tracking Study.Frontiers in human neuroscience · 2018Article
- Alexithymia and Autism Spectrum Disorder: A Complex Relationship.Frontiers in psychology · 2018Article
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4 authors.
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Abstract
This study investigated hypothetical moral choices in adults with high-functioning autism and the role of empathy and alexithymia in such choices. We used a highly emotionally salient moral dilemma task to investigate autistics' hypothetical moral evaluations about personally carrying out harmful utilitarian behaviours aimed at maximizing welfare. Results showed that they exhibited a normal pattern of moral judgments despite the deficits in social cognition and emotional processing. Further analyses revealed that this was due to mutually conflicting biases associated with autistic and alexithymic traits after accounting for shared variance: (a) autistic traits were associated with reduced utilitarian bias due to elevated personal distress of demanding social situations, while (b) alexithymic traits were associated with increased utilitarian bias on account of reduced empathic concern for the victim. Additionally, autistics relied on their non-verbal reasoning skills to rigidly abide by harm-norms. Thus, utilitarian moral judgments in autism were spared due to opposite influences of autistic and alexithymic traits and compensatory intellectual strategies. These findings demonstrate the importance of empathy and alexithymia in autistic moral cognition and have methodological implications for studying moral judgments in several other clinical populations.
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