新研究:自闭症很“自我为中心”？另一方面....

秋爸爸

转，BBC: Autism limit on ’self-awareness’
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/8407857.stm

剑桥大学新发在《脑》上的论文说，自闭症在“自我认识”上存在问题，难以自我反思，这也许可用以解释自闭症在社交场合下的困惑。
他们的证据来自功能核磁的观察，志愿者在实验中被要求评论自我，或其他人（实验中用的是女王，嘿，好大胆!）。
一直常认为自闭症患者很“自我为中心”，这研究告诉我们，他们其实对自己的看法和判断都难以把握。

补充意译：
脑的一个叫vMPFC的区域，已知是自我评价时会活跃的区域。对照实验发现，在谈论自己时，普通人这个区域会比谈论英王时更为活跃。可在自闭症患者那里，无论谈自己和谈女王，该区的活跃程度是一样的。
研究者引申分析说，社交场合中需要不断调整自我与他人之间的定位，有时候，“我们很类似”的相互认同感很重要，可在另一些场合，同样很重要的是需要意识到“你我有所不同”。而实验表明，自闭儿对自我做评价和对他人做评价时，信息加工处理却没什么差异。这对孩子的社会性发育可能很不利。
英国自闭症协会对此研究评价是 “有意思！”

People with autism 'have problem with self-awareness'

People with autism struggle in social situations
Scientists have produced evidence that self-awareness is a big problem for people with autism.
Sophisticated scans showed the brains of people with autism are less active when engaged in self-reflective thought.
The findings provide a neurological insight into why people with autism tend to struggle in social situations.
The study, by the University of Cambridge, appears in the journal Brain.
       
Autism has long been considered a condition of extreme egocentrism.
But research has shown the problem is people with the condition have trouble thinking about, and making sense of, themselves.
The researchers used functional magnetic resonance scans to measure brain activity in 66 male volunteers, half of whom had been diagnosed with an autistic spectrum disorder.
The volunteers were asked to make judgements either about their own thoughts, opinions, preferences, or physical characteristics, or about someone else's, in this case the Queen.
By scanning the volunteers' brains as they responded to these questions, the researchers were able to visualise differences in brain activity between those with and without autism.
They were particularly interested in part of the brain called the ventromedial pre-frontal cortex (vMPFC) - known to be active when people think about themselves.
The researchers found this area of the brain was more active when typical volunteers were asked questions about themselves compared with when they were thinking about the Queen.
However, in autism this brain region responded equally, irrespective of whether they were thinking about themselves or the Queen.
Researcher Michael Lombardo said the study showed that the autistic brain struggled to to process information about the self.
He said: "Navigating social interactions with others requires keeping track of the relationship between oneself and others.
"In some social situations it is important to notice that 'I am similar to you', while in other situations it might be important to notice that 'I am different to you'.
"The atypical way the autistic brain treats self-relevant information as equivalent to information about others could derail a child's social development, particularly in understanding how they relate to the social world around them."
Dr. Gina Gómez de la Cuesta, of the National Autistic Society, described the study as "interesting".
"We know many people with autism do want to interact with others and make friends but have difficulty recognising or understanding other people's thoughts and feelings.
"This research has shown that people with autism may also have difficulty understanding their own thoughts and feelings and the brain mechanisms underlying this."

秋爸爸

接受4楼批评，顶楼立刻补充意译。图像很艺术，符合lao v的审美要求，想他的评价必是："interesting"！

秋爸爸

谢谢楼上，我没研究，只是偶然一见顺手转帖一下。
这研究与mirror neurons和ToM应该算同宗的，英国那边比较盛行。当然，自闭症和脑太复杂了，也有很多这些理论解释不了的方面，对其持异议的也有。我个人意见，咱家长仅对了解一下而已，聊天用，勿深钻。
关于Imitation, mirror neurons and autism，可以参看：
http://www.cogsci.ucsd.edu/~pineda/CNL_WEBPAGE/PAPERS/Williams.pdf

7楼，同样犯了贴了英文不翻译的错误，butt？ 大学六级英语内都学不到的词汇，只好上谷歌，一查，喔，原来这样子的啊，2个。