Back to Basic: Do Children with Autism Spontaneously Look at Screen Displaying a Face or an Object?

Guimard-Brunault, Marie; Hernández, Noé Chávez; Roché, Laëtitia; Roux, Sylvie; Barthélémy, Catherine; Martineau, J.; Bonnet‐Brilhault, Frédérique

doi:10.1155/2013/835247

Cited by 15 publications

(16 citation statements)

References 37 publications

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“…In eye tracking, the mean time of screen exploration 32 during visual screening of face and object 14 , reported to be altered in persons with autism, was preserved in this sample. Pupil reactivity, however, revealed an atypical physiological response (i.e., higher dilation) to object in 22q13 patients compared to control.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 70%

22q13 deletion syndrome: communication disorder or autism? Evidence from a specific clinical and neurophysiological phenotype

et al. 2018

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Phelan–McDermid syndrome is related to terminal 22q13 deletions of various sizes affecting the SHANK3 gene. In this neurodevelopmental disorder, behavioural symptoms of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) are reported in half of cases. Extensive clinical and neurophysiological characterization is lacking to understand the genotype–phenotype correlation. Eighteen patients (8 males, mean age 12.7 years, SD = 9.2) with known 22q13 deletions were fully explored with determination of deletion size, along with behavioural, language and cognitive standardized assessments. Neurophysiological indices previously reported to be altered in autism (i.e., eye tracking in a social/non-social task and auditory evoked potential mismatch) were also recorded. Thirty-nine percent met ASD clinical criteria, exceeding cut-off scores on both ADI-R (Autism Diagnosis Interview based on the period spanning 4–5 years of age) and ADOS-2 (Autism Diagnosis Observation Schedule for the current period). All patients had intellectual disability and language disability. Deletion size was significantly correlated with expressive and receptive language disability but not with ASD standardized assessment scores. Developmental Quotient tended to be lower in patients with the largest deletions. Using Eye Tracking, smaller pupil size, which is typically described in ASD, was not observed in these patients. Furthermore, atypical shortened latency of mismatch negativity response previously reported in ASD was not observed, whereas the N250 pattern, related to language, was affected. Language disability combined with cognitive deficits may lead to autistic behavioural symptoms, but with different neurophysiological networks compared to typical autism. These results highlight the indication for early speech therapy rather than intensive autism programme to treat these patients.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 70%

22q13 deletion syndrome: communication disorder or autism? Evidence from a specific clinical and neurophysiological phenotype

et al. 2018

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“…Alongside these atypical brain responses, an atypical exploration of social stimuli [Guillon, Hadjikhani, Baduel, & Roge, ; Johnson, Lum, Rinehart, & Fielding, ; Jones & Klin, ; Klin, Jones, Schultz, Volkmar, & Cohen, ] and a failure to orient attention to relevant social stimuli are often reported in ASD [Klin et al, ; Klin, Shultz, & Jones, ]. Again, these peculiarities are not restricted to social stimulation [Guimard‐Brunault et al, ; Kovarski et al, ; Pei, Baldassi, & Norcia, ; Simmons et al, ] strengthening the idea that sensory processing might explain both social and nonsocial difficulties in ASD.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Faster eye movements in children with autism spectrum disorder

et al. 2018

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Atypical visual exploration of both social and nonsocial scenes is often reported in Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) with less precise and longer saccades, potentially reflecting difficulties in oculomotor control. To assess a subset of oculomotor functions in ASD, 20 children with ASD and 21 age‐matched typically developing (TD) children (2.6–11.5 years) partook in three tasks of increasing complexity, while no explicit instruction was provided: a prosaccade gap task, a color and a “categorical” visual search tasks (a face among butterflies and vice‐versa). In addition to classical saccade metrics, we measured Distance error, (the distance between the target and the closest gaze position) and Time‐to‐target (the time taken to reach the target). In the prosaccade task, children with ASD were as accurate as TD children, yet faster to reach the stimulus. In the color visual search task, children with ASD were faster but less precise than TD children. In the categorical visual search, while TD children were more precise in orienting their gaze towards the face, children with ASD performed similarly in the two conditions; Time‐to‐target did not differ. Our results provide contradictory evidence regarding enhanced visual search ability in ASD: when considering response times, enhanced visual search performance was found in one task only, while when considering gaze precision no advantage was found. These three experiments demonstrate that the automatic saccadic system may function more rapidly in children with ASD. Nonetheless, a diminished sensitivity to bottom–up saliency and top–down influence might suppress this advantage in more complex visual environments. Autism Res 2019, 12: 212–224 © 2018 International Society for Autism Research, Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Lay summary Three experiments with no instructions were designed to assess oculomotor functions in children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). In a saccade task, children with ASD were faster than but as accurate as control children. In visual search tasks, accuracy and speed decreased with increasing complexity of visual environment. Children with ASD showed faster automatic visual orientation, but this might hinder exploratory behaviors, leading to difficulties in complex and social situations.

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“…Impairments in shifting attention to novel visual and auditory stimuli have been proposed as the basic compromise on ASD’ individuals by Courchesne et al (1985); they point to the cerebellum as responsible for these abnormalities (Courchesne et al, 1994; Fatemi et al, 2012). A general decreased spontaneous visual attention to both , faces and objects, has been found in autistic individuals of different ages compared with non-autistic, and the degree of attentional deficit was related to autism severity (Guimard-Brunault et al, 2013). Similarly, a compromise of visual attention and saccadic reaction to faces and objects was found in a population of high risk 7 month-old infants who later developed ASD.…”

Section: Previous Asd Theoriesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Autism Pathogenesis: The Superior Colliculus

Jure

2019

Front. Neurosci.

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After been exposed to the visual input, in the first year of life, the brain experiences subtle but massive changes apparently crucial for communicative/emotional and social human development. Its lack could be the explanation of the very high prevalence of autism in children with total congenital blindness. The present theory postulates that the superior colliculus is the key structure for such changes for several reasons: it dominates visual behavior during the first months of life; it is ready at birth for complex visual tasks; it has a significant influence on several hemispheric regions; it is the main brain hub that permanently integrates visual and non-visual, external and internal information (bottom–up and top–down respectively); and it owns the enigmatic ability to take non-conscious decisions about where to focus attention. It is also a sentinel that triggers the subcortical mechanisms which drive social motivation to follow faces from birth and to react automatically to emotional stimuli. Through indirect connections it also activates simultaneously several cortical structures necessary to develop social cognition and to accomplish the multiattentional task required for conscious social interaction in real life settings. Genetic or non-genetic prenatal or early postnatal factors could disrupt the SC functions resulting in autism. The timing of postnatal biological disruption matches the timing of clinical autism manifestations. Astonishing coincidences between etiologies, clinical manifestations, cognitive and pathogenic autism theories on one side and SC functions on the other are disclosed in this review. Although the visual system dependent of the SC is usually considered as accessory of the LGN canonical pathway, its imprinting gives the brain a qualitatively specific functions not supplied by any other brain structure.

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Back to Basic: Do Children with Autism Spontaneously Look at Screen Displaying a Face or an Object?

Cited by 15 publications

References 37 publications

22q13 deletion syndrome: communication disorder or autism? Evidence from a specific clinical and neurophysiological phenotype

22q13 deletion syndrome: communication disorder or autism? Evidence from a specific clinical and neurophysiological phenotype

Faster eye movements in children with autism spectrum disorder

Autism Pathogenesis: The Superior Colliculus

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