'Hath charms to soothe . . .': an exploratory study of how high-functioning adults with ASD experience music

Abstract

Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 12 high-functioning adults on the autism spectrum, in order to examine the nature of their personal experiences of music. Consistent with the literature on typically developing people's engagement with music, the analysis showed that most participants exploit music for a wide range of purposes in the cognitive, emotional and social domains, including mood management, personal development and social inclusion. However, in contrast to typically developing people, the ASD group's descriptions of mood states reflected a greater reliance on internally focused (arousal) rather than externally focused (emotive) language.