As a participatory team of autistic and non-autistic researchers, we support Jaswal & Akhtar's (J&A's) critique of the social motivation theory of autism and agree that there are compelling alternative explanations of atypical behaviors in autism. We also advocate for greater inclusion of autistic people as research participants and researchers (see Milton Reference Milton2014). We believe that J&A's argument could be strengthened by a broader focus on the developmental origins of autistic people's domain-general challenges and experiences with others (see Kapp Reference Kapp2013). This commentary expands upon the article's evidence, methods, and suggestions for interventions and further research.

Low eye contact was among the four behaviors analyzed by J&A, and through it we extend their view that autism relates to sensory, perceptual, attentional, and motor systems. Infant sibling and other developmental autism research suggests that differences in these systems emerge at least as early as atypical social behaviors and may underlie them (Gallagher & Varga Reference Gallagher and Varga2015; Gliga et al. Reference Gliga, Jones, Bedford, Charman and Johnson2014; Rogers Reference Rogers2009). For example, atypically high eye contact and social attention within the first seven months predicts autism as well as face recognition, language, and motor difficulties in toddlers (Jones & Klin Reference Jones and Klin2013; Klerk et al. Reference Klerk, Gliga, Charman and Johnson2014; Pineda et al. Reference Pineda, Melchior, Oberle, Inder and Rogers2015; Young et al. Reference Young, Merin, Rogers and Ozonoff2009). This apparent paradox of strong early social responsiveness to caregivers’ faces, such as eye contact, predicting autism (Clifford et al. Reference Clifford, Hudry, Elsabbagh, Charman and Johnson2013; Del Rosario et al. Reference Del Rosario, Gillespie-Lynch, Johnson, Sigman and Hutman2014; Rozga et al. Reference Rozga, Hutman, Young, Rogers, Ozonoff, Dapretto and Sigman2011; Zappella et al. Reference Zappella, Einspieler, Bartl-Pokorny, Krieber, Coleman, Bölte and Marschik2015), with diminished responsiveness predicting infant siblings who fail to meet criteria (Clifford et al. Reference Clifford, Hudry, Elsabbagh, Charman and Johnson2013), may lie partly in visual and auditory hypersensitivities (see Cohen et al. Reference Cohen, Gardner, Karmel, Phan, Kittler, Gomez, Gonzalez, Lennon, Parab and Barone2013). The early decline in eye contact in infants later diagnosed with autism (Jones & Klin Reference Jones and Klin2013) may partly occur because autistic people often find eye contact intense and aversive, according to both self-report and brain scans (e.g., Dalton et al. Reference Dalton, Nacewicz, Johnstone, Schaefer, Gernsbacher, Goldsmith, Alexander and Davidson2005; Gernsbacher & Frymaire Reference Gernsbacher and Frymaire2005; Tottenham et al. Reference Tottenham, Hertzig, Gillespie-Lynch, Gilhooly, Millner and Casey2014). Conversely, and likely in part because of audiovisual synchrony (see Bahrick Reference Bahrick, Bremner and Wachs2010), lip-reading while listening enhances autistic people's communicative competence from infancy through adulthood to an atypical extent (Elsabbagh et al. Reference Elsabbagh, Bedford, Senju, Charman, Pickles and Johnson2014; Falck-Ytter et al. Reference Falck-Ytter, Fernell, Gillberg and Von Hofsten2010; Klin et al. Reference Klin, Jones, Schultz, Volkmar and Cohen2002; Norbury et al. Reference Norbury, Brock, Cragg, Einav, Griffiths and Nation2009; Tenenbaum et al. Reference Tenenbaum, Amso, Abar and Sheinkopf2014), which helps fulfill J&A's call for explorations of ways autistic people express social motivation.

The case of eye contact brings us to another point: while we appreciate J&A's use of autistic testimony, we believe their argument could be strengthened by drawing upon a greater variety of research that includes systematic study of autistic people's perspectives. For example, Tottenham et al. (Reference Tottenham, Hertzig, Gillespie-Lynch, Gilhooly, Millner and Casey2014) combined self-report with fMRI and eye-tracking. Turning to the area of interpersonal interaction, research using a variety of methodologies has found that autistic people self-report interest in relationships (e.g., Gillespie-Lynch et al. Reference Gillespie-Lynch, Kapp, Brooks, Pickens and Schwartzman2017b; Strunz et al. Reference Strunz, Schermuck, Ballerstein, Ahlers, Dziobek and Roepke2017). Although many autistic people say they want to connect with others, they report that anxiety and self-regulation difficulties can contribute to their atypical behaviors and complicate their interactions (e.g., Kapp et al. Reference Kapp, Gantman, Laugeson and Mohammadi2011). Many autistic people report that they have empathy (Gillespie-Lynch et al. Reference Gillespie-Lynch, Kapp, Brooks, Pickens and Schwartzman2017b), and research has found robust evidence for at least typical levels of emotional empathy and sympathy (e.g., Jones et al. Reference Jones, Happé, Gilbert, Burnett and Viding2010; Smith Reference Smith2009), heightened distress at others’ suffering (e.g., Rogers et al. Reference Rogers, Dziobek, Hassenstab, Wolf and Convit2007), reduced prejudice (Birmingham et al. Reference Birmingham, Stanley, Nair and Adolphs2015; Chien et al. Reference Chien, Wang, Chen, Chen and Chen2014; Dewinter et al. Reference Dewinter, Vermeiren, Vanwesenbeeck, Lobbestael and Van Nieuwenhuizen2015; Kirchner et al. Reference Kirchner, Schmitz and Dziobek2012; Wilson et al. Reference Wilson, Palermo, Burton and Brock2011), and decreased reliance on social stereotypes (Hirschfeld et al. Reference Hirschfeld, Bartmess, White and Frith2007; Zalla et al. Reference Zalla, Amsellem, Chaste, Ervas, Leboyer and Champagne-Lavau2014). Not only do autistic people often prioritize social topics in their conversations (Fletcher-Watson et al. Reference Fletcher-Watson, Leekam and Findlay2013) and goals (Mattys et al. Reference Mattys, Noens, Evers and Baeyens2018), but also autistic parents and spouses tend to feel satisfied with their relationships (Lau & Peterson Reference Lau and Peterson2011). Even social motivation theorists of autism acknowledge autistic people's close attachments to parents and offspring and interest in sexual and romantic relationships (Chevallier et al. Reference Chevallier, Kohls, Troiani, Brodkin and Schultz2012). Autistic people report relating to others differently; research has found them to have atypically wide developmental diversity in their relationships (Bauminger-Zviely et al. Reference Bauminger-Zviely, Karin, Kimhi and Agam-Ben-Artzi2014; Gunn et al. Reference Gunn, Trembath and Hudry2014) and to often relate better to fellow autistics (Komeda Reference Komeda2015; Rosqvist Reference Rosqvist2012; Strunz et al. Reference Strunz, Schermuck, Ballerstein, Ahlers, Dziobek and Roepke2017).

Despite their empathy, interest in relationships, and reduced prejudice, autistic people suffer exceptional rates of victimization (Sreckovic et al. Reference Sreckovic, Brunsting and Able2014), especially when they initiate social interaction, have higher skills, or appear more typical (Kapp Reference Kapp2018). These hardships may justifiably lead autistic youth to develop low expectations for social reciprocity (Cage et al. Reference Cage, Pellicano, Shah and Bird2013). Similarly, autistic adults report attempting to “pass” as neurotypical to fit in and make connections (Hull et al. Reference Hull, Petrides, Allison, Smith, Baron-Cohen, Lai and Mandy2017), but they experience more depression (Cage et al. Reference Cage, Di Monaco and Newell2018) and suicidality (Cassidy et al. Reference Cassidy, Bradley, Shaw and Baron-Cohen2018).

We have suggestions for future research and interventions. First, we believe that autistic people should be involved as co-researchers rather than merely as research participants (Nicolaidis et al. Reference Nicolaidis, Raymaker, McDonald, Dern, Ashkenazy, Boisclair, Robertson and Baggs2011; Wright et al. Reference Wright, Wright, Diener and Eaton2014). This participatory research should involve autistic researchers and participants with diverse backgrounds and communication support needs. Such research is likely to increase understanding of autistic people's needs. For example, Gillespie-Lynch et al. (Reference Gillespie-Lynch, Bublitz, Donachie, Wong, Brooks and D'Onofrio2017a) used participatory methods to develop a curriculum for a peer-mentorship program for autistic college students, many of whom expressed the need for training in self-advocacy and preferred inclusive programming aimed at increasing accessibility for all students. Participatory research may help to illuminate autistic people's atypical expressions of social motivation, such as hyperimitation of other people's actions, especially among autistics with greater interpersonal difficulties (Sowden et al. Reference Sowden, Koehne, Catmur, Dziobek and Bird2016, Spengler et al. Reference Spengler, Bird and Brass2010). Like echolalia (as argued by J&A), hyperimitation may be pathologized (as “echopraxia”) in autistics but accepted (as “mirroring”) in non-autistics. Second, we call for effective interventions to increase knowledge of autism (and thus reduce stigma), reduce bullying, and improve supports for autistic people (Gillespie-Lynch et al. Reference Gillespie-Lynch, Brooks, Someki, Obeid, Shane-Simpson, Kapp, Daou and Smith2015; Sasson & Morrison Reference Sasson and Morrison2017). Such empirically based interventions can engage with the “double empathy problem” – the mutual difficulties that autistic and non-autistic people have in understanding each other (Milton Reference Milton2012) – by helping interaction partners understand and support autistic people.