Investigating Mirror System (MS) Activity in Adults with ASD When Inferring Others’ Intentions Using Both TMS and EEG

Abstract

ASD is associated with mentalizing deficits that may correspond with atypical mirror system (MS) activation. We investigated MS activity in adults with and without ASD when inferring others’ intentions using TMS-induced motor evoked potentials (MEPs) and mu suppression measured by EEG. Autistic traits were measured for all participants. Our EEG data show, high levels of autistic traits predicted reduced right mu (8–10 Hz) suppression when mentalizing. Higher left mu (8–10 Hz) suppression was associated with superior mentalizing performances. Eye-tracking and TMS data showed no differences associated with autistic traits. Our data suggest ASD is associated with reduced right MS activity when mentalizing, TMS-induced MEPs and mu suppression measure different aspects of MS functioning and the MS is directly involved in inferring intentions.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (10.1007/s10803-018-3492-2) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Both the mirror and the affordance systems might be impaired in adults with high autistic traits. Evidence from EEG mu and beta rhythms

“…Understanding these stimuli involves tracking two‐hand coordinated actions (e.g., turning the cap of a bottle) as well as predicting the agent's goals and intentions [Kilner et al, ], presumably demanding more mirror neuron resources than simple clips of purposeless hand muscle movements. Some recent experiments confirm that using goal‐directed actions as stimuli and asking participants to infer the agent's intentions more likely reduce mu suppression in persons with ASD [Cole et al, ]. In our study, we did not asked participants to make intentional inferences or using any other active strategy.…”

“…However, other studies failed to show any difference between ASD and control participants in mu suppression during action observation tasks [Fan, Decety, Yang, Liu, & Cheng, ; Raymaekers, Wiersema, & Roeyers, ], or they only found reduced mu suppression in ASD when the observed action is produced by a familiar person rather than by a stranger [Oberman, Ramachandran, & Pineda, ]. The above discrepancy of results has been attributed to the heterogeneity of ASD participants [Raymaekers et al, ], the familiarity of the agent performing the action [Oberman et al, ], or the particular range of mu frequencies selected for the analysis [Cole et al, ; Dumas et al, ]. A more radical conclusion is that the current data provide little evidence that ASD persons have a global dysfunction in the MNS [Fan et al, ; Hamilton, ].…”

“…The hypothesis that ASD persons have a deficit in the MNS is supported by some studies showing that ASD persons, unlike neurotypical participants, do not exhibit mu rhythm suppression when they observe manual actions [Bernier, Dawson, Webb, & Murias, ; Cole, Barraclough, & Enticott, ; Dumas, Sousignan, Hugueville, Martinerie, & Nadel, ; Oberman & Ramachandran, ]. However, other studies failed to show any difference between ASD and control participants in mu suppression during action observation tasks [Fan, Decety, Yang, Liu, & Cheng, ; Raymaekers, Wiersema, & Roeyers, ], or they only found reduced mu suppression in ASD when the observed action is produced by a familiar person rather than by a stranger [Oberman, Ramachandran, & Pineda, ].…”

“…Adults with ASD, compared with neurotypical persons, showed reduction of low mu suppression when they were explicitly asked to judge the intentionality of observed actions [Cole et al, ]. Moreover, single pulse TMS applied over M1 in neurotypical participants revealed increased corticospinal excitability when they observed goal‐directed hand actions (Avenanti & Urgesi, ; Enticott, Kennedy, Bradshaw, Rinehart, & Fitzgerald, ; see Avenanti, Candidi, & Urgesi, , for a review), whereas in ASD persons the corticospinal modulation was generally reduced for these actions [Cole & Barraclough, ; Cole et al, ; Enticott et al, ]. Finally, in a neuroimaging study, high‐functioning ASD persons and neurotypical controls were asked to judge the intentionality of ordinary or anomalous actions [Libero et al, ].…”

Weighted Brain Network Metrics for Decoding Action Intention Understanding Based on EEG

“…Understanding others' intentions from their actions is thought to be an essential part of social interaction (Satpute et al, 2005 ; Cacippo et al, 2010 ; Ortigue et al, 2010 ; Catmur, 2015 ; Pereira et al, 2017 ; Pomiechowska and Csibra, 2017 ) and to play an important role in children's physiological growth and language learning (Fogassi et al, 2005 ; Ouden-Den et al, 2005 ; Brune and Woodward, 2007 ; Kaschak et al, 2010 ; Casteel, 2011 ; Isoda, 2016 ). However, the complex mechanism underlying action intention understanding has not been thoroughly decoded (Virji-Babul et al, 2010 ; Bonini et al, 2013 ; Catmur, 2015 ; Tidoni and Candidi, 2016 ; Cacioppo et al, 2017 ; Pomiechowska and Csibra, 2017 ; Cole and Barraclough, 2018 ; Cole et al, 2018 ). Exploring these neuronal mechanisms would be very useful for application into research on intelligent human-robot interaction (HRI) and brain-computer interface (BCI) (Zhang et al, 2015 ; Liu et al, 2017 ; Ofner et al, 2017 ).…”