Collinear facilitation and contour integration in autistic adults: Examining lateral and feedback connectivity

Gowen, Emma; Jachim, Stephen; Subri, Sabrina; Dickinson, Christine; Hamblin-Pyke, Benjamin; Warren, Paul A.

doi:10.1016/j.visres.2020.08.004

Cited by 10 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 89 publications

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“…This finding provides clear electrophysiologic evidence of disordered contour integration in children with ASD, extending beyond the preschool age cohort previously studied by Stroganova et al (2007) . Thus, despite several behavioral studies suggesting that children with ASD can accurately perceive ICs ( Milne and Scope, 2008 ; Hadad et al, 2019 ; Gowen et al, 2020 ), accumulating evidence points to clear differences in underlying neurophysiologic mechanisms that appear early in development and persist across childhood and adolescence.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Unfortunately, previous behavioral studies of IC perception in ASD children and adults have produced mixed results. Many have described no behavioral difference in closed contour integration in ASD relative to NT children or adults ( Milne and Scope, 2008 ; Hadad et al, 2019 ; Gowen et al, 2020 ). Yet, other studies have found ASD children exhibited lower performance than NT controls on tasks that required identification of illusory shapes ( Soroor et al, 2022 ), and lower accuracy along with longer reaction time in matching a solid shape with two illusory alternatives in the presence of local interference ( Nayar et al, 2017 ), implying a possible deficit in contour processing.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Severely Attenuated Visual Feedback Processing in Children on the Autism Spectrum

et al. 2023

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Individuals on the autism spectrum often exhibit atypicality in their sensory perception, but the neural underpinnings of these perceptual differences remain incompletely understood. One proposed mechanism is an imbalance in higher-order feedback re-entrant inputs to early sensory cortices during sensory perception, leading to increased propensity to focus on local object features over global context. We explored this theory by measuring visual evoked potentials during contour integration as considerable work has revealed that these processes are largely driven by feedback inputs from higher-order ventral visual stream regions. We tested the hypothesis that autistic individuals would have attenuated evoked responses to illusory contours compared to neurotypical controls. Electrophysiology was acquired while 29 autistic and 31 neurotypical children (7-17 years-old, inclusive of both males and females) passively viewed a random series of Kanizsa figure stimuli, each consisting of four inducers that were aligned either at random rotational angles or such that contour integration would form an illusory square. Autistic children demonstrated attenuated automatic contour integration over lateral occipital regions relative to neurotypical controls. The data are discussed in terms of the role of predictive feedback processes on perception of global stimulus features and the notion that weakened “priors” may play a role in the visual processing anomalies seen in autism.SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT:Children on the autism spectrum differ from typically developing children in many aspects of their processing of sensory stimuli. One proposed mechanism for these differences is an imbalance in higher order feedback to primary sensory regions, leading to an increased focus on local object features rather than global context. However, systematic investigation of these feedback mechanisms remains limited. Using electroencephalography (EEG) and a visual illusion paradigm that is highly dependent on intact feedback processing, we demonstrated significantly disruptions to visual feedback processing in children with autism. This provides much needed experimental evidence that advances our understanding of the contribution of feedback processing to visual perception in autism spectrum disorder.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Severely Attenuated Visual Feedback Processing in Children on the Autism Spectrum

et al. 2023

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“…Consistent with cortical microstructure (e.g., mini‐column width) differences across the caudal‐to‐rostral cortical hierarchy (Casanova et al, 2006; McKavanagh et al, 2015), neuroimaging evidence suggests that both bilateral middle occipital gyrus and right cuneus cortical surface area is larger in 6–12 month‐old infants at risk for ASDs, even before they are ultimately diagnosed (Hazlett et al, 2017). Differences in feedback and lateral connectivity may also contribute to differences in visuo‐spatial integration in those diagnosed with ASDs (Jachim et al, 2015; Kéta et al, 2011; c.f., Gowen et al, 2020).…”

Section: Viewing Attention Development Through the Lens Of Biased Com...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Attention along the cortical hierarchy: Development matters

Lynn

Amso

2021

WIRES Cognitive Science

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We build on the existing biased competition view to argue that attention is an emergent property of neural computations within and across hierarchically embedded and structurally connected cortical pathways. Critically then, one must ask, what is attention emergent from? Within this framework, developmental changes in the quality of sensory input and feedforward-feedback information flow shape the emergence and efficiency of attention. Several gradients of developing structural and functional cortical architecture across the caudal-torostral axis provide the substrate for attention to emerge. Neural activity within visual areas depends on neuronal density, receptive field size, tuning properties of neurons, and the location of and competition between features and objects in the visual field. These visual cortical properties highlight the information processing bottleneck attention needs to resolve. Recurrent feedforward and feedback connections convey sensory information through a series of steps at each level of the cortical hierarchy, integrating sensory information across the entire extent of the cortical hierarchy and linking sensory processing to higherorder brain regions. Higher-order regions concurrently provide input conveying behavioral context and goals. Thus, attention reflects the output of a series of complex biased competition neural computations that occur within and across hierarchically embedded cortical regions. Cortical development proceeds along the caudal-to-rostral axis, mirroring the flow in sensory information from caudal to rostral regions, and visual processing continues to develop into childhood.Examining both typical and atypical development will offer critical mechanistic insight not otherwise available in the adult stable state.

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“…Taken together with prior literature, this electrophysiologic work points to deficits in feedback-supported contour integration in ASD (Knight EJ,Freedman EG,Myers EJ,Berruti AS,Oakes LA,Cao CZ,Molholm S and Foxe JJ, 2023;Stroganova TA et al, 2007) that are evident despite conflicting results behaviorally on whether IC processing deficits are present in autism. Some studies have found no difference between ASD and NT on behavioral measures of contour integration (Gowen E et al, 2020;Hadad BS et al, 2019;Milne E and Scope A, 2008), while other studies have described reduced accuracy and longer reaction times in these tasks (Nayar K et al, 2017;Soroor G et al, 2022). This discrepancy between behavioral and electrophysiologic investigation suggests that individuals with ASD may accomplish equivalent IC perception, albeit via different mechanisms than their NT counterparts.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

It’s all in the timing: Delayed feedback in autism may weaken predictive mechanisms during contour integration

Knight,

Altschuler,

Molholm

et al. 2024

Preprint

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Humans rely on predictive mechanisms during visual processing to efficiently resolve incomplete or ambiguous sensory signals. While initial low-level sensory data are conveyed by feedforward connections, feedback connections are believed to shape sensory processing through conveyance of statistical predictions based on prior exposure to stimulus configurations. Individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) show biases in stimulus processing toward parts rather than wholes, suggesting their sensory processing may be less shaped by statistical predictions acquired through prior exposure to global stimulus properties. Investigations of illusory contour (IC) processing in neurotypical (NT) adults have established a well-tested marker of contour integration characterized by a robust modulation of the visually evoked potential (VEP), the IC-effect, that occurs over lateral occipital scalp during the timeframe of the N1 component. Converging evidence strongly supports the notion that this IC-effect indexes a signal with significant feedback contributions. Using high-density VEPs, we compared the IC-effect in 6-17 year-old children with ASD (n=32) or NT development (n=53). Both groups of children generated an IC-effect that was equivalent in amplitude. However, the IC-effect notably onset 21ms later in ASD, even though timing of initial VEP afference was identical across groups. This suggests that feedforward information predominated during perceptual processing for 15% longer in ASD compared to NT children. This delay in the feedback dependent IC-effect, in the context of known developmental differences between feedforward and feedback fibers, suggests a potential pathophysiological mechanism of visual processing in ASD, whereby ongoing stimulus processing is less shaped by statistical prediction mechanisms.

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Collinear facilitation and contour integration in autistic adults: Examining lateral and feedback connectivity

Cited by 10 publications

References 89 publications

Severely Attenuated Visual Feedback Processing in Children on the Autism Spectrum

Severely Attenuated Visual Feedback Processing in Children on the Autism Spectrum

Attention along the cortical hierarchy: Development matters

It’s all in the timing: Delayed feedback in autism may weaken predictive mechanisms during contour integration

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