In an interesting 2008 study, Vivanti and Rogers ruled out both motor impairment and following the task as reasons why children with autism have difficulty in an imitation task.  One finding that could be important is that the study participants with autism spent less time looking at the face.  This leads to the interesting idea that learning to better read emotions, an important component of social interactions,  might also improve imitation, which is another key component of social interactions:

“It could be that if people with autism could be better at reading emotion they might naturally start to imitate their models the way like other people do.”
—Sally Rogers, professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences

We can now quantitatively test our hypothesis that FaceSay increases attention to the area around the eyes in interactions with other people!  After months of pilot testing, Researchers at the University of Alabama, Birmingham recently placed an order for a an eye tracking system that is ideal for unobtrusively measuring where the study participant is looking when interacting with another person.   Attention to the eyes - which does not necessarily equate to eye contact - is thought to be important for reading emotions and possibly imitation, both of which are key components of social interactions.

I will be presenting a technology demo/poster presentation at the International Meeting for Autism Research in Chicago in May.  "FaceSay - Social Skills Games That Work" is scheduled for Friday, May  8, 2009, 9:00 AM
At the Chicago Hilton, in the Boulevard room.