Summary: Uncertainty commonly triggers anxiety, and people with higher autistic traits often feel this more intensely. New research from Nagoya University suggests that labeling emotions—putting feelings into words—can be an effective coping strategy. Providing the right vocabulary to describe distress appears to reduce anxiety driven by unpredictable situations.
The study indicates that helping someone identify and name their feelings makes uncertainty-driven anxiety less overwhelming, even if it does not eliminate the anxiety entirely.
Key Research Findings
- Intolerance of Uncertainty: Participants with higher autistic traits were more likely to react negatively to ambiguous or uncontrollable situations.
- The Power of Labeling: Writing down or saying an emotion aloud can reduce emotional intensity. Naming the feeling helps organize internal experiences and makes distress easier to manage.
- The Coping Link: A stronger tendency to put feelings into words was associated with lower anxiety levels, even among those who reported high discomfort with uncertainty.
- Autistic Traits in the General Population: The study measured autistic traits in 505 Japanese adults using the Autism-Spectrum Quotient (AQ), which evaluates social skills, attention shifting, communication, imagination, and attention to detail.
- Supportive Intervention: Offering language to describe feelings—for example, a teacher or family member saying, “You might be feeling anxious about this”—can help people manage distress they have difficulty expressing.
Source: Nagoya University
We tend to feel more anxious when events are uncertain, and this effect is often stronger for people who score higher on autistic traits.
Published in Scientific Reports, the study explores how uncertainty-driven anxiety affects emotional regulation and how affect labeling (putting feelings into words) may serve as an adaptive strategy. Researchers suggest that labeling can act as a cognitive anchor—transforming diffuse, overwhelming sensations into a structured, manageable experience.
Researchers at Nagoya University surveyed 505 Japanese adults aged 20 to 39 about autistic traits, intolerance of uncertainty, affect labeling, and anxiety. Autistic traits were measured with the 50-item Autism-Spectrum Quotient (AQ), covering five areas: social skills, attention shifting, communication, imagination, and attention to detail.
The results showed that higher autistic-trait scores correlated with stronger anxiety in uncertain situations—a pattern known as intolerance of uncertainty (IU). Those higher in IU were also more likely to try affect labeling, and when they did, their reported anxiety was lower. In other words, naming emotions appeared to reduce how overwhelming anxiety felt.
“Our findings suggest that discomfort with uncertainty is linked to a greater tendency to put feelings into words, and that tendency is associated with lower anxiety,” said Masahiro Hirai, coauthor and associate professor at the Graduate School of Informatics. The study highlights a practical implication: offering language to describe emotions can help people regulate anxiety in settings such as classrooms and counseling.
Putting a name to the feeling
Affect labeling is a simple cognitive technique that can be done alone or with support. Writing down how you feel, saying it out loud, or hearing someone else suggest a label can give structure to ambiguous bodily sensations and racing thoughts. While labeling does not erase anxiety, it reduces its intensity and makes it easier to manage.
Limitations and next steps
The authors caution that these results are preliminary. The study sampled people from the general population rather than individuals with clinical autism diagnoses, so findings should not be generalized to all autistic people without further research. The Hirai Lab is conducting follow-up work with adults who have clinical autism diagnoses to see if the same patterns hold. Longitudinal studies are also needed to determine whether these relationships reflect causal pathways over time.
Key Questions Answered:
A: No. Labeling does not eliminate anxiety, but it makes the experience less overwhelming by allowing the brain to categorize and organize the distress instead of leaving it as an indistinct jumble of sensations and thoughts.
A: Many autistic traits involve a preference for routine and predictability. Uncertain situations can disrupt an individual’s expected structure or “mental map,” triggering a stronger stress response than in people who are more comfortable with ambiguity.
A: They may not lack the desire to talk but the words to describe what they feel. Offering a gentle label—“It looks like you might be feeling overwhelmed by this change”—can give them the vocabulary to begin regulating the emotion.
Editorial Notes:
- This article was edited by a Neuroscience News editor.
- The journal paper was reviewed in full.
- Additional context was added by editorial staff.
About this autism research news
Author: Merle Naidoo
Source: Nagoya University
Contact: Merle Naidoo – Nagoya University
Image: The image is credited to Neuroscience News
Original Research: Open access. “Autism related traits and anxiety in the general population are linked through intolerance of uncertainty and affect labeling” by Akitaka Fujii & Masahiro Hirai. Scientific Reports. DOI: 10.1038/s41598-026-47237-8
Abstract
Autism related traits and anxiety in the general population are linked through intolerance of uncertainty and affect labeling
Anxiety is common in autism spectrum disorder and is often connected to intolerance of uncertainty (IU). Affect labeling (AL) is a cognitive strategy that reduces distress by structuring ambiguous sensations. However, autistic individuals sometimes have difficulty with AL, creating a paradox: a strategy that can reduce uncertainty-driven anxiety may be harder for them to access. This study examined whether IU might motivate the use of AL despite such difficulties.
In a cross-sectional sample of 505 adults, measures of autistic traits, IU, AL, and anxiety were analyzed. Two serial mediation models were tested: the Cognitive-Motivational Model (CMM), in which IU motivates AL, and the Emotion Regulation deficit Model (ERM), where AL deficits increase IU. Both models fit the data, but the CMM was favored for theoretical consistency. Established pathways showed that autistic traits link to anxiety through higher IU and lower AL. Importantly, a novel adaptive pathway also emerged: higher autistic traits were associated with higher IU, which in turn related to greater use of AL and lower anxiety. While these findings are theoretical rather than causal, they suggest IU can function both as a risk factor and as a motivational driver for emotion-labeling strategies.
This tension—between difficulty accessing AL and the motivation to use it to cope with uncertainty—may help explain individual differences in how people with higher autistic traits manage anxiety.