Background: Individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) have pronounced difficulties in attending
to relevant visual information during social interactions. Method: We designed and evaluated the feasibility of a
novel method to train this ability, by exposing participants to virtual human characters displayed on a screen which was entirely
blurred, except for a gaze-contingent viewing window that followed participants’ eyes direction. The goal was to incite
participants to direct their gaze towards the facial expressions of the virtual characters. Twenty-one adolescents with ASD who
attended ordinary school were randomized to either an experimental group, who was trained during a month and a half, or to a
control group. Social communicative abilities were assessed during pre, post and follow-up tests. Results: After
training, the experimental group showed significantly more interest in facial expressions on a test which involved understanding a
dialogue. Significant differences were not found for the other tests used. Conclusions: This outcome suggests that
the training method fostered participants’ awareness of the relevance of facial expressions.
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