Question

Robert is a 4-year-old boy who has autism spectrum disorder. When he comes across a favorite toy, he does not look at his mother or father and smile and then look back to the toy, thus communicating a desire to share his interest with his parents. Robert does not demonstrate an aspect of social reciprocity called ________.

Answer 1

Joint attention

Step-by-step explanation:

In psychology and psychopathology, the autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a condition that affects the way one person relates to their environment, specially other people. This condition usually interferes in their socialization and communication.

One of the difficulties that people with ASD is joint attention which refers to the ability to share the focus on an object with another person by using gestures or gazes to get the attention of another person on the object. In other words, they don't share their attention to an object with another person

Research shows that many people with autism have difficulty with joint attention.

In this example, Robert has ASD and when he comes across a favorite toy, he doesn't look at his parents to smile and take their attention to the toy, therefore not communicating a desire to share his interest with his parents. We can see that he is not using gestures to share his attention to his toy with his parents. Thus, he is not demonstrating joint attention.