The Cambridge Mindreading (CAM) Face-Voice Battery: Testing Complex Emotion Recognition in Adults with and without Asperger Syndrome Ofer Golan, 1,2, * Simon Baron-Cohen, 1 and Jacqueline Hill 1 Adults with Asperger Syndrome (AS) can recognise simple emotions and pass basic theory of mind tasks, but have difficulties recognising more complex emotions and mental states. This study describes a new battery of tasks, testing recognition of 20 complex emotions and mental states from faces and voices. The battery was given to males and females with AS and matched controls. Results showed the AS group performed worse than controls overall, on emotion recognition from faces and voices and on 12/20 specific emotions. Females recognised faces better than males regardless of diagnosis, and males with AS had more difficulties recognising emotions from faces than from voices. The implications of these results are discussed in relation to social functioning in AS. KEY WORDS: Emotion recognition; complex emotions; face perception; voice perception; theory of mind; Asperger Syndrome; autism spectrum; psychometrics. The ability to understand people’s emotional and other mental states, also known as ‘‘theory of mind’’ or ‘‘mindreading’’ (Wellman, 1992) underlies funda- mental social skills. This ability is also sometimes referred to as empathising (Baron-Cohen, 2002; Baron-Cohen, 2003). Individuals with autism spec- trum conditions have difficulties understanding others’ mental (including their emotional) states, which is thought to play a major role in their social and communicational difficulties (Baron-Cohen, 1995). The measurement and analysis of such diffi- culties may shed light on the phenotype of the autistic spectrum, and be clinically useful in diagnosis and treatment. The present study reports a new test battery to assess recognition of complex mental states. The standard test of emotion recognition (Ekman & Friesen, 1971) focuses on the ability to recognise six basic emotions that are recognised cross-culturally: happiness, sadness, anger, fear, surprise, and disgust. Some studies report that people with autism spectrum conditions have difficulties recognising such emotions from photographs (Bormann-Kischkel, Vilsmeier, & Baude, 1995), films (Yirmiya, Sigman, Kasari, & Mundy, 1992) and voice recordings (Loveland, Tunali Kotoski, Chen, & Brelsford, 1995) as well as with matching faces and voices of these emotions (Bu- itelaar, Van der Wees, Swabb Barneveld, & Van der Gaag, 1999; Hobson, 1986a, b). However, other studies (Grossman, Klin, Carter, & Volkmar, 2000; Loveland et al., 1997) have found that children and adolescents with high functioning autism or Asperger Syndrome (AS) have no difficulties in basic emotion 1 Department of Psychiatry, Autism Research Centre, Cambridge University, Douglas House, 18b Trumpington Road, CB2 2AH, Cambridge, UK. 2 Correspondence should be addressed to: Ofer Golan, Department of Psychiatry, Autism Research Centre, Cambridge University, Douglas House, 18b Trumpington Road, CB2 2AH, Cambridge, UK; Tel: 44 (0)1223 746062; Fax: 44 (0)1223 746033; e-mail: og211@cam.ac.uk 169 0162-3257/06/0200-0169/0 Ó 2006 Springer ScienceþBusiness Media, Inc. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, Vol. 36, No. 2, February 2006 (Ó 2006) DOI 10.1007/s10803-005-0057-y Published Online: February 14, 2006