Spatial Perspective-Taking in Children With Autism Spectrum Disorders: The Predictive Role of Visuospatial and Motor Abilities

Despite its impact on everyday functioning, spatial perspective-taking has rarely been investigated in autism spectrum disorders (ASD), and previous findings are surprisingly sparse and inconsistent. In the present study, we aimed to investigate spatial perspective-taking abilities in children and adolescents with ASD without intellectual disabilities, comparing them with a group of typically developing (TD) peers. Our objectives were: (i) to test similarities and differences between these groups in a spatial perspective-taking task; and (ii) to see whether similar or different underlying processes (i.e., fine and gross motor skills, and visuospatial abilities) might account for the groups’ performance in the spatial perspective-taking task. A group of children with ASD (N = 36) was compared with a TD group (N = 39), aged from 8 to 16 years. Participants were administered tasks assessing spatial perspective-taking, fine and gross motor skills, visuo-constructive abilities, visuospatial working memory, visual imagery, and mental rotation. Our results revealed that the ASD group had more difficulty with the spatial perspective-taking task than the TD group. The two groups also had some shared and some different processes that predicted their perspective-taking performance: a significant predictive effect of fine motor skills and visuospatial working memory emerged for both groups, while gross motor skills (i.e., walking heel-to-toe) and visuospatial imagery only revealed a role in the TD group. These findings suggest that different abilities might account for the two groups’ performance in the spatial perspective-taking task. Gross motor skills and complex visuospatial abilities seem to be more important in sustaining spatial perspective-taking ability in typical development than in the event of ASD. Some of the clinical and educational implications of these findings are discussed.