Objective Pediatric brain tumor survivors (PBTS) experience deficits in social functioning. Facial expression and identity recognition are key components of social information processing and are widely studied as an index of social difficulties in youth with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and other neurodevelopmental conditions. This study evaluated facial expression and identity recognition among PBTS, youth with ASD, and typically developing (TD) youth, and the associations between these face processing skills and social impairments. Methods PBTS (N = 54; ages 7–16) who completed treatment at least 2 years prior were matched with TD (N = 43) youth and youth with ASD (N = 55) based on sex and IQ. Parents completed a measure of social impairments and youth completed a measure of facial expression and identity recognition. Results Groups significantly differed on social impairments (p < .001), with youth with ASD scoring highest followed by PBTS and lastly TD youth. Youth with ASD performed significantly worse on the two measures of facial processing, while TD youth and PBTS were not statistically different. The association of facial expression recognition and social impairments was moderated by group, such that PBTS with higher levels of social impairment performed worse on the expression task compared to TD and ASD groups (p < .01, η2 = 0.07). Conclusions Variability in face processing may be uniquely important to the social challenges of PBTS compared to other neurodevelopmental populations. Future directions include prospectively examining associations between facial expression recognition and social difficulties in PBTS and face processing training as an intervention for PBTS.

中文翻译：

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小儿脑肿瘤幸存者的面部处理和社会功能

目的小儿脑肿瘤幸存者 (PBTS) 在社会功能方面存在缺陷。面部表情和身份识别是社会信息处理的关键组成部分，并被广泛研究为患有自闭症谱系障碍 (ASD) 和其他神经发育状况的青年的社会困难指数。本研究评估了 PBTS、ASD 青少年和典型发育 (TD) 青少年的面部表情和身份识别，以及这些面部处理技能与社交障碍之间的关联。方法 根据性别和智商，将至少 2 年前完成治疗的 PBTS（N = 54；7-16 岁）与 TD（N = 43）青年和 ASD 青年（N = 55）进行匹配。父母完成了社交障碍的测量，青少年完成了面部表情和身份识别的测量。结果 各组在社交障碍方面存在显着差异（p < .001），ASD 青少年得分最高，其次是 PBTS，最后是 TD 青少年。患有 ASD 的青少年在面部处理的两项测量中表现明显较差，而 TD 青少年和 PBTS 没有统计学差异。面部表情识别与社交障碍的关联在各组中有所缓和，因此与 TD 和 ASD 组相比，具有较高社交障碍水平的 PBTS 在表情任务上的表现更差（p < .01，η2 = 0.07）。结论 与其他神经发育人群相比，面部处理的可变性对于 PBTS 的社会挑战可能具有独特的重要性。