An extended multisensory temporal binding window in autism spectrum disorders

Abstract

Autism spectrum disorders (ASD) form a continuum of neurodevelopmental disorders, characterized by deficits in communication and reciprocal social interaction, as well as by repetitive behaviors and restricted interests. Sensory disturbances are also frequently reported in clinical and autobiographical accounts. However, surprisingly few empirical studies have characterized the fundamental features of sensory and multisensory processing in ASD. The current study is structured to test for potential differences in multisensory temporal function in ASD by making use of a temporally dependent, low-level multisensory illusion. In this illusion, the presentation of a single flash of light accompanied by multiple sounds often results in the illusory perception of multiple flashes. By systematically varying the temporal structure of the audiovisual stimuli, a “temporal window” within which these stimuli are likely to be bound into a single perceptual entity can be defined. The results of this study revealed that children with ASD report the flash-beep illusion over an extended range of stimulus onset asynchronies relative to children with typical development, suggesting that children with ASD have altered multisensory temporal function. These findings provide valuable new insights into our understanding of sensory processing in ASD and may hold promise for the development of more sensitive diagnostic measures and improved remediation strategies.

Multisensory Integration of Low-level Information in Autism Spectrum Disorder: Measuring Susceptibility to the Flash-Beep Illusion

“…Various researchers have determined that there does exist an extended temporal binding window in ASD, meaning that individuals with ASD continue to integrate sensory information over a larger gap in time than do TD individuals (Foss-Feig et al 2010;Kwakye et al 2011;Woynaroski et al 2013). The current results indicating that the ASD group had significantly lower accuracy than the TD group on the 2F1B (i.e., fusion illusion) and 2F0B trials may be explained by the presence of an expanded temporal binding window.…”

“…Foss Feig et al (2010) studied children with and without ASD on the flash beep task, but specifically looked at temporal binding windows for the fission illusion. They found that children with ASD had approximately a doubly large temporal binding window as compared to the TD group (i.e., they were integrating 2 beeps over a 600 ms window, whereas the TD group was only integrating over 300 ms window.)…”

“…Foss-Feig et al (2010) modified the original paradigm by altering the temporal presentation of the beeps in conjunction with the flash. In doing so, they were able to determine whether temporal factors might be at play in integrating visual and auditory information to produce the flash-beep illusion.…”

“…Temporal binding windows allow multisensory information to be integrated even when there might be slight temporal asynchronies . In individuals with ASD, it appears that there might be an enlarged or expanded temporal binding window as compared to TD individuals (Baum et al 2015;Foss-Feig et al 2010;Kwakye et al 2011;Stevenson et al 2014a;Wallace and Stevenson 2014). This would mean that individuals with ASD would perceive asynchronous stimuli as simultaneous more so than TD individuals would.…”

“…While some research has been conducted using the flash-beep paradigm in ASD, these studies have either only studied high-functioning individuals with elevated IQ's, examined one of the two flash-beep illusions (i.e., only fission) or have only studied one age group (Foss-Feig et al 2010;Keane et al 2010;Stevenson et al 2014b;van der Smagt et al 2007). Furthermore, studies using similar low-level paradigms (e.g., visual search) have yielded inconsistent results (de BoerSchellekens et al 2013;Collignon et al 2013).…”