Individuals with Autistic-Like Traits Show Reduced Lateralization on a Greyscales Task

Abstract

Individuals with autism spectrum conditions attend less to the left side of centrally presented face stimuli compared to neurotypical individuals, suggesting a reduction in right hemisphere activation. We examined whether a similar bias exists for non-facial stimuli in a large sample of neurotypical adults rated above-or belowaverage on the autism spectrum quotient (AQ). Using the ''greyscales'' task, we found the typical leftward bias in the below-average group was significantly reduced in the above-average group. Moreover, a negative correlation between leftward bias and the social skills factor of the AQ suggested a link between atypical hemispheric activation and social difficulties in high-AQ trait individuals that extends to non-facial stimuli.

Exploring What’s Missing: What Do Target Absent Trials Reveal About Autism Search Superiority?

“…Importantly, correlations between the endpoint of initial saccades and ASD symptom severity showed that a lack of leftward visual-attentional asymmetry is related to greater sociocommunicative deficits. This result is consistent with the finding that individuals with higher autistic traits show reduced lateralization on a greyscales task (English, Maybery, & Visser, 2015), and may suggest that the association between visual-spatial processing strengths and sociocommunicative weaknesses result from generalized reduction in the hemispheric specialization of neurocognitive networks in ASD.…”

Modulating attentional biases of adults with autistic traits using transcranial direct current stimulation: A pilot study

“…Consistent with this hypothesis, anodal tDCS significantly increased pseudoneglect in our High ALT group relative to sham stimulation, while not yielding a significant increase in pseudoneglect in our Low ALT group. Such a pattern of results would be expected as the result of baseline pre-stimulation differences in RH activation between the two groups [English et al, 2015;Loftus & Nicholls, 2012]. That is, the increased cortical excitability arising from anodal tDCS would more effectively increase RH activation in our High ALT group with lower pre-stimulation baseline, than in the Low ALT group, with relatively higher pre-stimulation RH activity.…”

“…Greyscales task. The task was adapted from English et al [2015]. Stimuli were generated using Presentation software (Version 17.0, Neurobehavioral Systems) and presented on a 24" BenQ XL2420T monitor.…”

“…Compared to controls, adults with ASC and infants with older ASC siblings show reduced eye‐gaze to the left side of centrally‐presented faces [Dundas, Best, Minshew, & Strauss, ; Dundas et al, ], whilst adults with Asperger Syndrome show reduced leftward bias on face‐identity matching [Ashwin, Wheelwright, & Baron‐Cohen, ]. Similar patterns are also found for neurotypical individuals with high levels of autistic‐like traits (High ALT) viewing non‐face stimuli [English, Maybery, & Visser, , 2017].…”

“…The present study aims to provide preliminary examination of the attentional changes induced via anodal and cathodal tDCS of the right PPC of neurotypical adults with Low and High ALT. Attentional changes as a result of tDCS were assessed by measuring performance on the greyscales task [Nicholls, Bradshaw, & Mattingley, ], which has been shown to be sensitive to differences in attentional bias between Low and High ALT groups [English et al, ].…”