This study examined how deaf or hard-of-hearing (DHH) and typically hearing (TH) children may differ in their family system and emotional functioning and examined the relations between family system and children's emotional functioning. Parents of 106 DHH and 99 TH children (2-6 years) reported on family cohesion and adaptability, parental emotion…

In order to better understand protective factors for internalizing problems, this longitudinal study examined positive emotions, emotion awareness and (non-)emotional communication skills in relation to somatic complaints and social anxiety in children with (N = 104) and without (N = 183) Developmental Language Disorder (DLD) using self-reported…

Empathy evokes support for the person in distress, and thus strengthening social cohesion. The question is to what extent empathic reactions can be observed in autistic adolescents and autistic girls in particular, since there is evidence that they have better social skills than boys, which might hinder their recognition as autistic. We examined…

Children and adolescents with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) often show comorbid emotional and behavior problems. The aim of this longitudinal study is to examine the relation between emotion control (i.e., negative emotionality, emotion awareness, and worry/rumination) and the development of internalizing and externalizing problems. Boys with and…

The main aim of this study was to examine the extent to which affective and cognitive empathy were associated with reactive and proactive aggression, and whether these associations differed between children with an Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) and typically developing (TD) children. The study included 133 children (67 ASD, 66 TD, M age = 139…

Purpose: Symptoms of depression are common in children and adolescents with an autism spectrum disorder (ASD), but information about underlying developmental factors is limited. Depression is often linked to aspects of emotional functioning such as coping strategies, but in children with ASD difficulties with social interactions are also a likely…

It is still largely unknown how receiving a cochlear implant affects the emotion understanding in deaf children. We examined indices for emotion understanding and their associations with communication skills in children aged 2.5-5 years, both hearing children (n = 52) and deaf children with a cochlear implant (n = 57). 2 aspects of emotion…

In this study, deaf children's understanding of their own emotions was compared with that of hearing peers. Twenty-six deaf children (mean age 11 years) and 26 hearing children, matched for age and gender, were presented with various tasks that tap into their emotion awareness and regulation (coping) regarding the four basic emotions (happiness,…

The aim of this study was to examine the unique contribution of two aspects of emotion regulation (awareness and coping) to the development of internalizing problems in 11-year-old high-functioning children with an autism spectrum disorder (HFASD) and a control group, and the moderating effect of group membership on this. The results revealed…

The present study examined the understanding of emotional transfer in 11 children with autism, 20 children with PDD-NOS and 31 typically developing children, aged 6 to 12 years. Children were asked about their emotional responses to successive, conflicting emotional situations. All children reported that preceding emotional situations would…

The diagnostic criteria of autism spectrum disorders (ASD) include emotional impairments. However, scientific evidence for these impairments is varied and subtle. In this contribution, recent empirical studies that examined the emotional competence in children and adolescents with ASD are reviewed. Four aspects of emotional competence that are…

This study examined emotional awareness in children with autism. Twenty-two high functioning children with autism (mean age 10 years and 2 months) and 22 typically developing children, matched for age and gender, were presented with the four basic emotions (happiness, anger, sadness and fear) in single and multiple emotion tasks. Findings suggest…

We tested whether children with and without high-functioning autism spectrum disorders (HFASD) differ in their understanding of the influence of mood states on behaviour. A total of 122 children with HFASD or typical development were asked to predict and explain the behaviour of story characters during hypothetical social interactions. HFASD and…