ArticleJournal of autism and developmental disorders2025
Simulated Contact and Attitudes Toward Autistic Adults: Effects of Gender of the Autistic Adult and Mediation by Intergroup Anxiety.
Article in Journal of autism and developmental disorders, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 3 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Who cites it
3 citing papers in PubMed.
- De-gendering and dehumanization in mental representations of autistic men's and women's facial appearance.Scientific reports · 2026Article
- A qualitative study on the experience of stigma of family caregivers of children with autism from the perspective of family empowerment.BMC nursing · 2026Article
- The Effect of Labeling During Simulated Contact on Attitudes Toward Autistic Adults.Autism in adulthood · 2025Article
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Authors and funding
3 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
purposeNeurotypical peers tend to have negative attitudes toward autistic peers, which may contribute to negative outcomes for autistic individuals. The present study was designed to build upon previous findings by testing whether simulating contact with an individual labeled as autistic and exhibiting stereotypical autistic behaviors, which has been shown to improve neurotypical individuals' attitudes toward autistic peers, depended on the gender of the imagined person. We also examined whether intergroup anxiety mediated the effects of simulated contact on these attitudes.
methodsNeurotypical undergraduate participants (n = 194) were assigned to simulated contact scenarios in which the person in the imagined contact situation was labeled as autistic or not, exhibited stereotypical autistic behaviors or not and was given a female-identifying or male-identifying name. Participants completed questionnaires that assessed their attitudes toward autism, their previous contact with autistic individuals and their intergroup anxiety with future interactions with autistic people.
resultsAs expected, after imagining contact with a person exhibiting stereotypical autistic behaviors, attitudes toward autistic individuals were more positive following interactions with male- but not female-identifying autistic partners. Intergroup anxiety was found to be a mediator of the effects of imagined contact on attitudes toward autistic individuals.
conclusionThese findings lend further support for imagined contact as a method to improve attitudes toward autistic individuals, identify intergroup anxiety as a mediator and begin to demonstrate some situations, such as imagining a female-identifying autistic individual, where imagined contact may not be effective in changing attitudes.
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