Anthropomorphic tendencies in autism: A conceptual replication and extension of White and Remington (2019) and preliminary development of a novel anthropomorphism measure

Clutterbuck, Rachel A., Shah, Punit, Leung, Hok Sze, Gjersoe, Natalia, Callan, Mitchell J. and Livingston, Lucy A. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8597-6525 2022. Anthropomorphic tendencies in autism: A conceptual replication and extension of White and Remington (2019) and preliminary development of a novel anthropomorphism measure. Autism 26 (4) , pp. 940-950. 10.1177/13623613211039387

PDF - Published Version Available under License Creative Commons Attribution. Download (183kB)

Abstract

White and Remington (2019) found that autistic people may have increased anthropomorphic tendencies to ascribe human-like attributes to non-human agents. However, it was unclear from their study whether this relationship holds after accounting for socio-demographic variables known to be associated with anthropomorphism. The psychometric properties of the anthropomorphism questionnaire they used has also not been investigated, raising concerns about whether it measures the same construct in people with differing levels of autistic traits. Addressing these issues, we re-examined the relationship between autism and anthropomorphism in a large sample of adults (N = 492). Conceptually replicating White and Remington, we found that autistic traits were significantly associated with greater anthropomorphic tendencies, even after accounting for age and sex (Study 1). Equally, psychometric concerns with the anthropomorphism questionnaire were revealed, leading us to refine this measure and re-analyse the data. A less clear-cut but significant association between autistic traits and anthropomorphism was found (Study 2). Our refined anthropomorphism measure also had improved psychometric properties, particularly showing that it is suitable for future autism research. Our findings are discussed in relation to individual differences in social-cognitive processing and we outline future directions for investigating mechanisms linking anthropomorphism and social cognition in autism.

Item Type:	Article
Date Type:	Publication
Status:	Published
Schools:	Psychology
Publisher:	SAGE Publications
ISSN:	1362-3613
Date of First Compliant Deposit:	22 September 2021
Date of Acceptance:	15 July 2021
Last Modified:	03 May 2023 20:23
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/144341

Citation Data

Cited 1 time in Scopus. View in Scopus. Powered By Scopus® Data

Actions (repository staff only)

Edit Item