Executive functioning and local‐global visual processing: candidate endophenotypes for autism spectrum disorder?

Abstract

Impaired cognitive flexibility, ideational fluency and response inhibition are strong candidate endophenotypes for ASD. They could help to delineate etiologically more homogeneous subgroups, which is clinically important to allow assigning ASD probands to different, more targeted, interventions.

ADHD-related symptoms and attention profiles in the unaffected siblings of probands with autism spectrum disorder: focus on the subtypes of autism and Asperger’s disorder

“…This contrast might suggest that the unaffected sib-pair of AS may share more attention deficits than autism sib-pairs. Notably, these differences between unaffected siblings of autism and AS will be overlooked when the two conditions are grouped into one single category of ASD, supporting the importance of looking into the subgroups within the whole spectrum concerning the neurocognitive function [45]. In addition, our findings added to the current knowledge of the shared neurocognitive deficits between ASD probands and their unaffected siblings (e.g., executive function such as cognitive flexibility [43–45] and planning [43, 47, 48]) by showing that a more fundamental function, attention performance (e.g., focused attention and sustained attention), may also be involved, particularly for siblings of AS probands.…”

“…Notably, these differences between unaffected siblings of autism and AS will be overlooked when the two conditions are grouped into one single category of ASD, supporting the importance of looking into the subgroups within the whole spectrum concerning the neurocognitive function [45]. In addition, our findings added to the current knowledge of the shared neurocognitive deficits between ASD probands and their unaffected siblings (e.g., executive function such as cognitive flexibility [43–45] and planning [43, 47, 48]) by showing that a more fundamental function, attention performance (e.g., focused attention and sustained attention), may also be involved, particularly for siblings of AS probands. Whether the attention deficits co-segregate with other neurocognitive functions (like the co-segregation of social cognition and executive function [74]) and how these deficits (e.g., higher response variability, lower vigilance) influence other neurocognitive functions (e.g., cognitive flexibility) in the siblings warrant further investigation.…”

“…In contrast, despite evidence of impaired sustained attention in ASD as shown in ADHD [42], there have been no studies testing whether attention profiles assessed by CPT can be an intermediate phenotype or endophenotype for ASD. Several studies have shown that the unaffected siblings, like ASD probands, revealed executive dysfunction including impaired cognitive flexibility [43–45], generativity/ideational fluency [45, 46], response inhibition [45], and planning [43, 47, 48]. These results suggest that the above deficits could be strong candidate endophenotypes for ASD.…”

“…These results suggest that the above deficits could be strong candidate endophenotypes for ASD. Some researchers proposed that these endophenotypes can help delineate subgroups from more homogeneous etiologies, allowing the clinicians to develop more specific interventions [45]. As CPT is a widely used neuropsychological test with a relatively simple paradigm examining a fundamental neurocognitive function, it is clinically relevant to test whether attention deficits measured by CPT can be an endophenotype for ASD.…”

Differential profiles of response inhibition deficit between male children with autism spectrum disorders and schizophrenia

“…A meta-analysis [Geurts et al, 2014] of behavioral studies investigating response inhibition in ASD reported that individuals with ASD (mean age = 14.8 years) have more difficulties in inhibiting response impulses than typically developing controls, but results from studies using the Stroop-like task revealed more heterogeneity and inconsistent findings: the effect size was 0.31 for the Stroop-like task and the frank task, but dropped to 0.19 after excluding the Stroop-like task. Response inhibition deficits have also been found in people with autistic traits [Gökçen, Frederickson, & Petrides, 2016] and the relatives of ASD probands [Van Eylen et al, 2017], and thus are considered a candidate endophenotype for ASD [Van Eylen et al, 2017]. Besides, impaired response inhibition is also associated with ASD symptoms, such as inappropriate speech, stereotypical behavior, and unusual interests [Faja & Nelson, 2018;Mostert-Kerckhoffs, Staal, Houben, & de Jonge, 2015].…”