Brief Report: Which Came First? Exploring Crossmodal Temporal Order Judgements and Their Relationship with Sensory Reactivity in Autism and Neurotypicals

Abstract

Previous studies have indicated that visual-auditory temporal acuity is reduced in children with autism spectrum conditions (ASC) in comparison to neurotypicals. In the present study we investigated temporal acuity for all possible bimodal pairings of visual, tactile and auditory information in adults with ASC (n = 18) and a matched control group (n = 18). No group differences in temporal acuity for crossmodal stimuli were observed, suggesting that this may be typical in adults with ASC. However, visual-tactile temporal acuity and bias towards vision when presented with visual-auditory information were both predictors of self-reported sensory reactivity. This suggests that reduced multisensory temporal acuity and/or attention towards vision may contribute to atypical sensory reactivity.

GABA Concentration in the Left Ventral Premotor Cortex Associates With Sensory Hyper-Responsiveness in Autism Spectrum Disorders Without Intellectual Disability

“…Previous accounts of highly cognitive domains, such as temporal processing of stimulus, in ASD may also implicate links between the left vPMC and sensory hyper-responsiveness given reduced inhibitory cortical neuron activity (Poole et al, 2017;Ide et al, 2019). Our previous study elucidated that individuals with ASD who showed high resolution of tactile stimulus temporal order tended to have severer sensory hyperresponsiveness (Yaguchi et al, 2020).…”

Individual differences in sensory sensitivity: A synthesizing framework and evidence from normal variation and developmental conditions

“…One study that did found that subjective sensory hyper-sensitivity was related to reduced visuo-tactile temporal acuity and increased visual bias when presented with multisensory stimuli in both autistic and neurotypical individuals (Poole, Gowen, Warren, & Poliakoff, 2017).…”

Atypical Multisensory Integration and the Temporal Binding Window in Autism Spectrum Disorder

“…Stevenson et al 2016 ). When using non-social stimuli, some studies have reported no significant differences between ASD and TD groups in the size of the TBW (Poole et al 2017 ; Stevenson et al 2018b ) whereas other studies found that individuals with ASD have a wider TBW compared to TD individuals (Kwakye et al 2011 ; de Boer-Schellekens et al 2013 ). On the other hand, Kawakami et al ( 2018 ) reported that TD adults who have higher autistic traits are more sensitive to time lags between auditory and visual stimuli (i.e., narrow TBW).…”