Effects of Cognitive-Behaviour Distance Treatment for Postpartum Depression on the Mother-Infant Relationship

Typical infants begin to engage in active communication with their mothers in the first two months of life. In face-to-face interactions, infants and mothers match the emotions they express to each other. This early emotional communication helps the infant develop more advanced communication and social understanding. It has been suggested that the social and communicative impairments in autism result from a failure to develop this early emotional sharing. Face-to-face interactions in young children with autism may not be experienced as pleasurable, but rather may evoke fight-flight responses. Although there is evidence that autistic children show little emotion in social interactions, almost nothing is known about what happens behaviourally and physiologically when they do express emotions socially. Our research will examine these factors in young autistic children interacting with their mothers. Mothers will be asked to engage their children in interactions with and without toys. Since autistic children have been found to be more socially engaged when playing with toys they prefer, mothers will also be asked to play with their children with a favourite toy. The emotional engagement of autistic children will be compared to that of non-autistic children. We expect autistic children to show less positive emotional sharing and more fight-flight responses when they do interact. If the behavioural and physiological measures are sensitive and specific to children with autism, particularly in the no-toy task, then these measures may help in the early detection of autism. Also, evidence of enhanced positive emotional sharing with a preferred toy would have important implications for our understanding of the nature of autism and its treatment.