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Marlitt Tippetts

Autism Spectrum, Attachments Styles, and Social Skills in University Student

Biology 1615 Lab.

Salt Lake Community College

March 27, 2017

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Autism Spectrum, Attachments Styles, and Social skills in University Students.

Introduction

Autism spectrum disorder is a developmental disorder characterized by deficits of social

interaction, communication and low range of interest in social interactions.

According to research studies, scientists are investigating the relationships between

autism spectrum disorder and the magnitude of the child attachment measured by the Strange

Situation Procedure (SSP) method. As scientists already know, 65%, 15% and 20% of children

are generally classified as having the three attachment styles: having a secure, anxious, and

avoidant attachment style. According to the SSP method 53% of children with autism are

classified having a secure attachment style.

The researchers found how the autism spectrum disorder affects individuals sense of

ability and self-efficacy. They also examined the differences of each subscale score of the

internal working model (IWM) between two groups: high and low Autism-spectrum Quotient

(AQ). The results of the present study add to existing knowledge of autism spectrum disorder

and attachment style.

The scientists chose to study autism to find solutions to not only problems of children

who developed autism but its effects on society. Information they gather are based on how

attachment problems have been used and developed through information.

Materials and Methods

The scientists tested 468 university students who had no diagnosis of autism spectrum

disorder, (183 men and 285 women), the range of age between 18 to 23 years. The scientists

measured autism spectrum tendency by using a Japanese version of the AQ, consisting on 50
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items in various situations. Attachment style was measured by the IWM scale, rating at a five

point scale.

Surprisingly, the AQ consists of five subscales: social skills, local details, attention

switching, communication and imagination. A high score on the AQ indicates a high degree of

autism spectrum traits.

The Attachment style they measured was used by the Internal Working Model (IWM).

The same way of questionnaire consists of 18 items the test retested on reliability and internal

consistency of the IWM scale. As an example of the question on the IWM scale included: I am

easier to get to know than most people, I have more self-doubts than most people (pg 515) the

results of this were shown to be good.

In social skills the scientists tested were measured by Kikuchis social skills scales

(KISS-18), 18 items on various situations involving social interaction. The KISS-18 followed

conservations and practical questions to each subject and is a single-factor model. As an example

of the question on KISS 18 was: Do you tend to halt a conversation while talking with

someone, Can you explain well what you want someone to do.(pg 515). The results show also

good.

Results

The results reflected on tests: Psychometric Properties of the AQ, IWM, and KISS-18. In

this study shows that the scores on these 3 tests are: AQ score 21.38, examining the differences

between males and females in AQ scores. The results show that males had higher AQ scores than

females did.

There was no significant difference between men and women in the total IWM scores and

the reliability coefficients for the secure, anxious and avoidant types were .86, .79, and .72.
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The mean KISS-18 was 56.95 again indicating no marking a big difference between males

and females.

Discussion

Autism spectrum disorder is not a disease, is a disorder of development that persists

throughout on individuals life. Researchers implied that attachment relationships provide an

internal representation of how others interact with an individual with autism. They believed

that the relationship between AQ scores and attachment style made a great difference in the

results of interaction and the autistic individuals life.

Studies investigated the relationships between total AQ scores and the IWM subscales:

the higher AQ score, the lower the IWM secure subscale and the higher AQ score, the higher

IWM anxious and avoidant subscales scores.

In addition, AQ scores where close correlated with the KISS-18, that indicating the

higher AQ score, the lower the KISS-18 score.

These results indicated that people with high AQ scores might less of a tendency to

exhibit secure attachment and a greater tendency to exhibit anxious and avoidant attachment

styles.

Some researchers may argue that the results that might not be able to be generalized to

those with a diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder because the experiment was composed of

university students who did not have a diagnosis. This is interesting because these same similar

characteristics of people with a diagnosis may be extended to a people that experienced a typical
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development. The present results provide additional knowledge about these relationships

between autism spectrum, attachment style and social skills.

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Reference

Takahashi, J., Tamaki, K. & Yamawaki, N. (2013). Autism Spectrum, Attachment Styles,

and Social Skills in University Student. Creative Education, 4, 514-520, doi:

10.4236/ce.2013.48075.