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Dahl RE, Armstrong-Carter E, van den Bos W. Wanting to matter and learning to care: A neurodevelopmental window of opportunity for (Pro) social learning? Dev Cogn Neurosci 2024; 69:101430. [PMID: 39151254 DOI: 10.1016/j.dcn.2024.101430] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/15/2024] [Revised: 07/26/2024] [Accepted: 08/03/2024] [Indexed: 08/19/2024] Open
Abstract
Wanting to matter-to feel socially recognized, appreciated, and capable of actions that benefit others-represents a fundamental motivation in human development. The motivational salience of mattering appears to increase in adolescence. Evidence suggests this is related to pubertal increases in the incentive salience for gaining social value and personal agency. This can provide a useful heuristic for understanding motivational proclivities (i.e. wanting to matter) that influence action-outcome learning as young adolescents are exploring and learning how to navigate increasingly complex social and relational environments. Adolescence also brings new capacities, motives, and opportunities for learning to care about and contribute to the benefit of others. Together, these create a window of opportunity: a sensitive period for learning to gain salient feelings of mattering through caring prosocial actions and valued societal contributions. Successfully discovering ways of mattering by doing things that matter to others may contribute to formative socio-emotional learning about self/other. Advances in understanding these social and relational learning processes and their neurodevelopmental underpinnings can inform strategies to improve developmental trajectories of social competence and wellbeing among adolescents growing up in a rapidly changing and increasingly techno-centric world.
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Affiliation(s)
- Ronald E Dahl
- School of Public Health, Institute of Human Development, University of California, Berkeley, United States.
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2
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Vernetti A, Butler M, Banarjee C, Boxberger A, All K, Macari S, Chawarska K. Face-to-face live eye-tracking in toddlers with autism: Feasibility and impact of familiarity and face covering. Autism Res 2024; 17:1381-1390. [PMID: 38009948 DOI: 10.1002/aur.3060] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/14/2023] [Accepted: 10/31/2023] [Indexed: 11/29/2023]
Abstract
Studies utilizing eye-tracking methods have potential to promptly capture real-world dynamics of one of the core areas of vulnerability in autism spectrum disorders (ASD), selective social attention. So far, no studies have successfully reported utilizing the method to examine social attention in toddlers with neurodevelopmental vulnerabilities in real world and challenging settings such as an interactive face-to-face. This study examined the feasibility and validity of live eye-tracking method in response to live interaction occurring in several contexts in toddlers with and without ASD. Forty-seven toddlers with ASD, with atypical development (ATYP), or typically developing (TD), underwent a 30-s live eye-tracking procedure during a face-to-face interaction with a masked stranger using child-directed-speech (16 ASD, 14 ATYP, 17 TD; Mage = 23.44 months, SD = 6.02). Out of this group of toddlers, 29 (10 ASD, 8 ATYP, 11 TD, Mage = 21.97 months, SD = 5.76) underwent the same procedure with one of their maskless parent. Task completion rate, calibration accuracy, and affective response (feasibility measures) as well as attention to the task and the social partner (validity measures) were examined. Task completion rate and calibration accuracy were excellent. Despite the challenging context of face-to-face interaction, the toddlers exhibited a neutral affect, and high attention to the task and the speaker. As anticipated, toddlers with ASD looked less at the social partner compared with control groups. However, attention was comparable between the Stranger and Parent conditions, indicating that the effect was consistent regardless of presence of face covering or the familiarity of the interactive partner. The study demonstrates the high feasibility and validity of a live eye-tracking task involving face-to-face interaction in neurodiverse toddlers with social vulnerabilities. The effect of diminished attention to social partners in toddlers with autism is robust and present when interacting with an unfamiliar person and parent. The results suggest that a brief live eye-tracking method constitutes a promising ecologically valid candidate biomarker and potential intervention outcome in autism.
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Affiliation(s)
- Angelina Vernetti
- Child Study Center, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, Connecticut, USA
| | - Maureen Butler
- Child Study Center, Northwestern University, Chicago, Illinois, USA
| | - Chitra Banarjee
- Child Study Center, University of Central Florida, Orlando, Florida, USA
| | - Alexandra Boxberger
- Child Study Center, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, Connecticut, USA
| | - Katherine All
- Child Study Center, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, Connecticut, USA
| | - Suzanne Macari
- Child Study Center, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, Connecticut, USA
| | - Katarzyna Chawarska
- Child Study Center, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, Connecticut, USA
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3
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Nelson CA, Sullivan E, Engelstad AM. Annual Research Review: Early intervention viewed through the lens of developmental neuroscience. J Child Psychol Psychiatry 2024; 65:435-455. [PMID: 37438865 DOI: 10.1111/jcpp.13858] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 05/24/2023] [Indexed: 07/14/2023]
Abstract
The overarching goal of this paper is to examine the efficacy of early intervention when viewed through the lens of developmental neuroscience. We begin by briefly summarizing neural development from conception through the first few postnatal years. We emphasize the role of experience during the postnatal period, and consistent with decades of research on critical periods, we argue that experience can represent both a period of opportunity and a period of vulnerability. Because plasticity is at the heart of early intervention, we next turn our attention to the efficacy of early intervention drawing from two distinct literatures: early intervention services for children growing up in disadvantaged environments, and children at elevated likelihood of developing a neurodevelopmental delay or disorder. In the case of the former, we single out interventions that target caregiving and in the case of the latter, we highlight recent work on autism. A consistent theme throughout our review is a discussion of how early intervention is embedded in the developing brain. We conclude our article by discussing the implications our review has for policy, and we then offer recommendations for future research.
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Affiliation(s)
- Charles A Nelson
- Department of Pediatrics and Neuroscience, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
- Division of Developmental Medicine, Department of Pediatrics, Boston Children's Hospital, Boston, MA, USA
- Harvard Graduate School of Education, Cambridge, MA, USA
| | - Eileen Sullivan
- Division of Developmental Medicine, Department of Pediatrics, Boston Children's Hospital, Boston, MA, USA
- Harvard Graduate School of Education, Cambridge, MA, USA
| | - Anne-Michelle Engelstad
- Division of Developmental Medicine, Department of Pediatrics, Boston Children's Hospital, Boston, MA, USA
- Harvard Graduate School of Education, Cambridge, MA, USA
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4
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Yoon CD, Xia Y, Terol AK, Meadan H, Lee JD. Correlation Between Gaze Behaviors and Social Communication Skills of Young Autistic Children: A Meta-Analysis of Eye-Tracking Studies. J Autism Dev Disord 2024:10.1007/s10803-024-06257-x. [PMID: 38400896 DOI: 10.1007/s10803-024-06257-x] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 01/17/2024] [Indexed: 02/26/2024]
Abstract
This meta-analysis examined correlations between eye-tracking measures of gaze behaviors manifested during dynamic salient social stimuli and behavioral assessment measures of social communication skills of young autistic children. We employed a multilevel model with random effects to perform three separate meta-analyses for correlation between social communication skills and (a) all gaze behaviors, (b) gaze duration, and (c) gaze transition. Subsequently, we performed meta-regression to assess the role of four moderators, including age, continuum of naturalness of stimuli, gaze metric, and area of interest, on correlation effect sizes that were heterogeneous at the population level. A total of 111 correlation coefficients from 17 studies for 1132 young autistic children or children with high-likelihood for autism (Mage range = 6-95 months) were included in this meta-analysis. The correlation effect sizes for all three meta-analyses were significant, supporting the relation between improved gaze behaviors and better social communication skills. In addition, age, gaze metric, and area of interest were significant moderators. This suggests the importance of identifying meaningful gaze behaviors related to social communication skills and the increasingly influential role of gaze behaviors in shaping social communication skills as young autistic children progress through the early childhood stage. The continuum of naturalness of stimuli, however, was revealed to trend towards having a significant moderating effect. Lastly, it is important to note the evidence of potential publication bias. Our findings are discussed in the context of early identification and intervention and unraveling the complex nature of autism.
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Affiliation(s)
- Christy D Yoon
- Department of Special Education, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, 1310 South Sixth Street, Champaign, IL, 61820, USA.
| | - Yan Xia
- Department of Educational Psychology, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, 1310 South Sixth Street, Champaign, IL, 61820, USA
| | - Adriana Kaori Terol
- Department of Special Education, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, 1310 South Sixth Street, Champaign, IL, 61820, USA
| | - Hedda Meadan
- Department of Special Education, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, 1310 South Sixth Street, Champaign, IL, 61820, USA
| | - James D Lee
- Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, University of Washington, 6901 Sand Point Way NE, Seattle, WA, 98115, USA
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5
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Marrus N, Botteron KN, Hawks Z, Pruett JR, Elison JT, Jackson JJ, Markson L, Eggebrecht AT, Burrows CA, Zwaigenbaum L, Dager S, Estes A, Hazlett H, Schultz RT, Piven J, Constantino JN. Social motivation in infancy is associated with familial recurrence of ASD. Dev Psychopathol 2024; 36:101-111. [PMID: 36189644 PMCID: PMC10067534 DOI: 10.1017/s0954579422001006] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/07/2022]
Abstract
Pre-diagnostic deficits in social motivation are hypothesized to contribute to autism spectrum disorder (ASD), a heritable neurodevelopmental condition. We evaluated psychometric properties of a social motivation index (SMI) using parent-report item-level data from 597 participants in a prospective cohort of infant siblings at high and low familial risk for ASD. We tested whether lower SMI scores at 6, 12, and 24 months were associated with a 24-month ASD diagnosis and whether social motivation's course differed relative to familial ASD liability. The SMI displayed good internal consistency and temporal stability. Children diagnosed with ASD displayed lower mean SMI T-scores at all ages and a decrease in mean T-scores across age. Lower group-level 6-month scores corresponded with higher familial ASD liability. Among high-risk infants, strong decline in SMI T-scores was associated with 10-fold odds of diagnosis. Infant social motivation is quantifiable by parental report, differentiates children with versus without later ASD by age 6 months, and tracks with familial ASD liability, consistent with a diagnostic and susceptibility marker of ASD. Early decrements and decline in social motivation indicate increased likelihood of ASD, highlighting social motivation's importance to risk assessment and clarification of the ontogeny of ASD.
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Affiliation(s)
- Natasha Marrus
- Department of Psychiatry, Washington University School of Medicine
| | | | - Zoë Hawks
- Department of Psychological & Brain Sciences, Washington University in St. Louis
| | - John R. Pruett
- Department of Psychiatry, Washington University School of Medicine
| | - Jed T. Elison
- Institute of Child Development, University of Minnesota
| | - Joshua J. Jackson
- Department of Psychological & Brain Sciences, Washington University in St. Louis
| | - Lori Markson
- Department of Psychological & Brain Sciences, Washington University in St. Louis
| | - Adam T. Eggebrecht
- Mallinckrodt Institute of Radiology, Washington University School of Medicine
| | | | | | | | - Annette Estes
- Department of Speech and Hearing Sciences, University of Washington
| | - Heather Hazlett
- Department of Psychiatry, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
| | | | - Joseph Piven
- Department of Psychiatry, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
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Lockwood Estrin G, Mason L, Arora R, Bhavnani S, Dasgupta J, Gulati S, Gliga T, Johnson MH. Attention control in autism: Eye-tracking findings from pre-school children in a low- and middle-income country setting. AUTISM : THE INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF RESEARCH AND PRACTICE 2024; 28:43-57. [PMID: 36700615 DOI: 10.1177/13623613221149541] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 01/27/2023]
Abstract
LAY ABSTRACT The development of cognitive processes, such as attention control and learning, has been suggested to be altered in children with a diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder. However, nearly all of our understanding of the development of these cognitive processes comes from studies with school-aged or older children in high-income countries, and from research conducted in a controlled laboratory environment, thereby restricting the potential generalisability of results and away from the majority of the world's population. We need to expand our research to investigate abilities beyond these limited settings. We address shortcomings in the literature by (1) studying attention control and learning in an understudied population of children in a low- and middle-income country setting in India, (2) focusing research on a critical younger age group of children and (3) using portable eye-tracking technology that can be taken into communities and healthcare settings to increase the accessibility of research in hard-to-reach populations. Our results provide novel evidence on differences in attention control and learning responses in groups of children with and without a diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder. We show that learning responses in children that we assessed through a portable eye-tracking task, called the 'antisaccade task', may be specific to autism. This suggests that the methods we use may have the potential to identify and assess autism-specific traits across development, and be used in research in low-resource settings.
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Affiliation(s)
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | - Mark H Johnson
- Birkbeck, University of London, UK
- University of Cambridge, UK
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7
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Akin-Bulbul I, Ozdemir S. Imitation Performance in Children with Autism and the Role of Visual Attention in Imitation. J Autism Dev Disord 2023; 53:4604-4617. [PMID: 36085430 DOI: 10.1007/s10803-022-05726-5] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 08/18/2022] [Indexed: 10/14/2022]
Abstract
In this study, we examined imitation performance, visual attention, and the relationship between imitation and visual attention of children with autism, developmental delay (DD), and typically developing (TD) children. The study findings revealed that children with autism and DD imitated less than TD children in all imitation tasks. Results also showed that children with autism spent less time looking at the model's face and movement area and more time looking at the external area. Lastly, the relationship between imitation and visual attention separated the study groups. The findings of the study provided new evidence that visual attention to movement area in children with autism was positively related to imitation performance in non-meaningful gestures.
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Affiliation(s)
- Isik Akin-Bulbul
- Department of Special Education, Gazi Education Faculty, Gazi University, Teknikokullar, Ankara, Turkey.
| | - Selda Ozdemir
- Department of Special Education, Education Faculty, Hacettepe University, Beytepe, Ankara, Turkey
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8
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Stallworthy IC, Berry D, Davis S, Wolff JJ, Burrows CA, Swanson MR, Grzadzinski RL, Botteron K, Dager SR, Estes AM, Schultz RT, Piven J, Elison JT, Pruett JR, Marrus N. Quantifying latent social motivation and its associations with joint attention and language in infants at high and low likelihood for autism spectrum disorder. Dev Sci 2023; 26:e13336. [PMID: 36222317 PMCID: PMC10591497 DOI: 10.1111/desc.13336] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/30/2021] [Revised: 07/11/2022] [Accepted: 09/09/2022] [Indexed: 01/29/2023]
Abstract
Social motivation-the psychobiological predisposition for social orienting, seeking social contact, and maintaining social interaction-manifests in early infancy and is hypothesized to be foundational for social communication development in typical and atypical populations. However, the lack of infant social-motivation measures has hindered delineation of associations between infant social motivation, other early-arising social abilities such as joint attention, and language outcomes. To investigate how infant social motivation contributes to joint attention and language, this study utilizes a mixed longitudinal sample of 741 infants at high (HL = 515) and low (LL = 226) likelihood for ASD. Using moderated nonlinear factor analysis (MNLFA), we incorporated items from parent-report measures to establish a novel latent factor model of infant social motivation that exhibits measurement invariance by age, sex, and familial ASD likelihood. We then examined developmental associations between 6- and 12-month social motivation, joint attention at 12-15 months, and language at 24 months of age. On average, greater social-motivation growth from 6-12 months was associated with greater initiating joint attention (IJA) and trend-level increases in sophistication of responding to joint attention (RJA). IJA and RJA were both positively associated with 24-month language abilities. There were no additional associations between social motivation and future language in our path model. These findings substantiate a novel, theoretically driven approach to modeling social motivation and suggest a developmental cascade through which social motivation impacts other foundational skills. These findings have implications for the timing and nature of intervention targets to support social communication development in infancy. HIGHLIGHTS: We describe a novel, theoretically based model of infant social motivation wherein multiple parent-reported indicators contribute to a unitary latent social-motivation factor. Analyses revealed social-motivation factor scores exhibited measurement invariance for a longitudinal sample of infants at high and low familial ASD likelihood. Social-motivation growth from ages 6-12 months is associated with better 12-15-month joint attention abilities, which in turn are associated with greater 24-month language skills. Findings inform timing and targets of potential interventions to support healthy social communication in the first year of life.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Daniel Berry
- Institute of Child Development, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA
| | - Savannah Davis
- Department of Psychiatry, Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, St Louis, Missouri, USA
| | - Jason J. Wolff
- Department of Educational Psychology, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA
| | | | - Meghan R. Swanson
- School of Behavioral and Brain Sciences, University of Texas at Dallas, Richardson, Texas, USA
| | - Rebecca L. Grzadzinski
- Department of Psychiatry, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, North Carolina, USA
| | - Kelly Botteron
- Department of Psychiatry, Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, St Louis, Missouri, USA
| | - Stephen R. Dager
- Departments of Radiology and Bioengineering, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington, USA
| | - Annette M. Estes
- Department of Speech and Hearing Sciences, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington, USA
| | - Robert T. Schultz
- Department of Pediatrics, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA
| | - Joseph Piven
- Department of Psychiatry, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, North Carolina, USA
| | - Jed T. Elison
- Institute of Child Development, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA
- Department of Pediatrics, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA
| | - John R. Pruett
- Department of Psychiatry, Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, St Louis, Missouri, USA
| | - Natasha Marrus
- Department of Psychiatry, Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, St Louis, Missouri, USA
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Dawson G, Rieder AD, Johnson MH. Prediction of autism in infants: progress and challenges. Lancet Neurol 2023; 22:244-254. [PMID: 36427512 PMCID: PMC10100853 DOI: 10.1016/s1474-4422(22)00407-0] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/27/2022] [Revised: 09/17/2022] [Accepted: 09/27/2022] [Indexed: 11/24/2022]
Abstract
Autism spectrum disorder (henceforth autism) is a neurodevelopmental condition that can be reliably diagnosed in children by age 18-24 months. Prospective longitudinal studies of infants aged 1 year and younger who are later diagnosed with autism are elucidating the early developmental course of autism and identifying ways of predicting autism before diagnosis is possible. Studies that use MRI, EEG, and near-infrared spectroscopy have identified differences in brain development in infants later diagnosed with autism compared with infants without autism. Retrospective studies of infants younger than 1 year who received a later diagnosis of autism have also showed an increased prevalence of health conditions, such as sleep disorders, gastrointestinal disorders, and vision problems. Behavioural features of infants later diagnosed with autism include differences in attention, vocalisations, gestures, affect, temperament, social engagement, sensory processing, and motor abilities. Although research findings offer insight on promising screening approaches for predicting autism in infants, individual-level predictions remain a future goal. Multiple scientific challenges and ethical questions remain to be addressed to translate research on early brain-based and behavioural predictors of autism into feasible and reliable screening tools for clinical practice.
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Affiliation(s)
- Geraldine Dawson
- Duke Center for Autism and Brain Development, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Duke University School of Medicine, Durham, NC, USA.
| | - Amber D Rieder
- Duke Center for Autism and Brain Development, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Duke University School of Medicine, Durham, NC, USA; Duke Global Health Institute, Duke University, Durham, NC, USA
| | - Mark H Johnson
- Department of Psychology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK; Centre for Brain and Cognitive Development, Birkbeck, University of London, London, UK
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Putnam OC, Sasson N, Parish-Morris J, Harrop C. Effects of social complexity and gender on social and non-social attention in male and female autistic children: A comparison of four eye-tracking paradigms. Autism Res 2023; 16:315-326. [PMID: 36408851 DOI: 10.1002/aur.2851] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/03/2021] [Accepted: 10/31/2022] [Indexed: 11/22/2022]
Abstract
Eye tracking has long been used to characterize differences in social attention between autistic and non-autistic children, but recent work has shown that these patterns may vary widely according to the biological sex of the participants and the social complexity and gender-typicality of the eye tracking stimuli (e.g., barbies vs. transformers). To better understand effects of sex, social complexity, and object gender-typicality on social and non-social gaze behavior in autism, we compared the visual attention patterns of 67 autistic (ASD) and non-autistic (NA) males (M) and females (F) (ASD M = 21; ASD F = 18; NA M = 14; NA F = 14) across four eye tracking paradigms varying in social complexity and object gender-typicality. We found consistency across paradigms in terms of overall attention and attention to social stimuli, but attention to objects varied when paradigms considered gender in their stimulus design. Children attended more to gendered objects, particularly when the gender-typicality of the object matched their assigned sex. These results demonstrate that visual social attention in autism is affected by interactions between a child's biological sex, social scene complexity, and object gender-typicality and have broad implications for the design and interpretation of eye tracking studies.
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Affiliation(s)
- Orla C Putnam
- Division of Health Sciences, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, North Carolina, USA
| | - Noah Sasson
- School of Behavioral and Brain Sciences, University of Texas at Dallas, Richardson, Texas, USA
| | - Julia Parish-Morris
- Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA.,Department of Psychiatry, Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA
| | - Clare Harrop
- Division of Health Sciences, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, North Carolina, USA.,TEACCH Autism Program, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, North Carolina, USA
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11
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Li K, Lu A, Deng R, Yi H. The Unique Cost of Human Eye Gaze in Cognitive Control: Being Human-Specific and Body-Related? PSICHOLOGIJA 2022. [DOI: 10.15388/psichol.2022.59] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 01/13/2023] Open
Abstract
This study investigated the eye gaze cost in cognitive control and whether it is human-specific and body-related. In Experiment 1, we explored whether there was a cost of human eye gaze in cognitive control and extended it by focusing on the role of emotion in the cost. Stroop effect was found to be larger in eye-gaze condition than vertical grating condition, and to be comparable across positive, negative, and neutral trials. In Experiment 2, we explored whether the eye gaze cost in cognitive control was limited to human eyes. No larger Stroop effect was found in feline eye-gaze condition, neither the modulating role of emotion. In Experiment 3, we explored whether the mouth could elicit a cost in Stroop effect. Stroop effect was not significantly larger in mouth condition compared to vertical grating condition, nor across positive, negative, and neutral conditions. The results suggest that: (1) There is a robust cost of eye gaze in cognitive control; (2) Such eye-gaze cost was specific to human eyes but not to animal eyes; (3) Only human eyes could have such eye-gaze costs but not human mouth. This study supported the notion that presentation of social cues, such as human eyes, could influence attentional processing, and provided preliminary evidence that the human eye plays an important role in cognitive processing.
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12
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Dubey I, Brett S, Ruta L, Bishain R, Chandran S, Bhavnani S, Belmonte MK, Estrin GL, Johnson M, Gliga T, Chakrabarti B. Quantifying preference for social stimuli in young children using two tasks on a mobile platform. PLoS One 2022; 17:e0265587. [PMID: 35648753 PMCID: PMC9159616 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0265587] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/25/2020] [Accepted: 03/07/2022] [Indexed: 11/19/2022] Open
Abstract
Children typically prefer to attend to social stimuli (e.g. faces, smiles) over non-social stimuli (e.g. natural scene, household objects). This preference for social stimuli is believed to be an essential building block for later social skills and healthy social development. Preference for social stimuli are typically measured using either passive viewing or instrumental choice paradigms, but not both. Since these paradigms likely tap into different mechanisms, the current study addresses this gap by administering both of these paradigms on an overlapping sample. In this study, we use a preferential looking task and an instrumental choice task to measure preference for social stimuli in 3-9 year old typically developing children. Children spent longer looking at social stimuli in the preferential looking task but did not show a similar preference for social rewards on the instrumental choice task. Task performance in these two paradigms were not correlated. Social skills were found to be positively related to the preference for social rewards on the choice task. This study points to putatively different mechanisms underlying the preference for social stimuli, and highlights the importance of choice of paradigms in measuring this construct.
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Affiliation(s)
- Indu Dubey
- Centre for Autism, School of Psychology & Clinical Language Sciences, University of Reading, Reading, United Kingdom
| | - Simon Brett
- Centre for Autism, School of Psychology & Clinical Language Sciences, University of Reading, Reading, United Kingdom
| | - Liliana Ruta
- Institute of Applied Sciences and Intelligent Systems, National Research Council of Italy (CNR), Messina, Italy
| | - Rahul Bishain
- Department of Computer Science and Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, Mumbai, India
| | - Sharat Chandran
- Department of Computer Science and Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, Mumbai, India
| | - Supriya Bhavnani
- Centre for Chronic Conditions and Injuries, Public Health Foundation of India, Gurgaon, India
- Sangath, New Delhi, India
| | - Matthew K. Belmonte
- Com DEALL Trust, Bangalore, India
- Division of Psychology, Nottingham Trent University, Nottingham, United Kingdom
| | - Georgia Lockwood Estrin
- Centre for Brain and Cognitive Development, Birkbeck University of London, London, United Kingdom
| | - Mark Johnson
- School of Psychology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, United Kingdom
| | - Teodora Gliga
- School of Psychology, University of East Anglia, Norwich, United Kingdom
| | - Bhismadev Chakrabarti
- Centre for Autism, School of Psychology & Clinical Language Sciences, University of Reading, Reading, United Kingdom
- Department of Psychology, Ashoka University, Sonipat, India
- India Autism Center, Kolkata, India
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13
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Xiao Y, Wen TH, Kupis L, Eyler LT, Goel D, Vaux K, Lombardo MV, Lewis NE, Pierce K, Courchesne E. Neural responses to affective speech, including motherese, map onto clinical and social eye tracking profiles in toddlers with ASD. Nat Hum Behav 2022; 6:443-454. [PMID: 34980898 DOI: 10.1038/s41562-021-01237-y] [Citation(s) in RCA: 10] [Impact Index Per Article: 5.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/21/2020] [Accepted: 10/22/2021] [Indexed: 12/11/2022]
Abstract
Affective speech, including motherese, captures an infant's attention and enhances social, language and emotional development. Decreased behavioural response to affective speech and reduced caregiver-child interactions are early signs of autism in infants. To understand this, we measured neural responses to mild affect speech, moderate affect speech and motherese using natural sleep functional magnetic resonance imaging and behavioural preference for motherese using eye tracking in typically developing toddlers and those with autism. By combining diverse neural-clinical data using similarity network fusion, we discovered four distinct clusters of toddlers. The autism cluster with the weakest superior temporal responses to affective speech and very poor social and language abilities had reduced behavioural preference for motherese, while the typically developing cluster with the strongest superior temporal response to affective speech showed the opposite effect. We conclude that significantly reduced behavioural preference for motherese in autism is related to impaired development of temporal cortical systems that normally respond to parental affective speech.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yaqiong Xiao
- Autism Center of Excellence, Department of Neurosciences, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, CA, USA.
| | - Teresa H Wen
- Autism Center of Excellence, Department of Neurosciences, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, CA, USA
| | - Lauren Kupis
- Department of Psychology, University of Miami, Coral Gables, FL, USA
| | - Lisa T Eyler
- Department of Psychiatry, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, CA, USA
- VISN 22 Mental Illness Research, Education, and Clinical Center, VA San Diego Healthcare System, San Diego, CA, USA
| | - Disha Goel
- Autism Center of Excellence, Department of Neurosciences, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, CA, USA
| | - Keith Vaux
- Point Loma Pediatrics, UC San Diego Health Physician Network, San Diego, CA, USA
| | - Michael V Lombardo
- Laboratory for Autism and Neurodevelopmental Disorders, Center for Neuroscience and Cognitive Systems @UniTn, Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia, Rovereto, Italy
- Autism Research Centre, Department of Psychiatry, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK
| | - Nathan E Lewis
- Department of Pediatrics, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, CA, USA
| | - Karen Pierce
- Autism Center of Excellence, Department of Neurosciences, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, CA, USA.
| | - Eric Courchesne
- Autism Center of Excellence, Department of Neurosciences, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, CA, USA.
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14
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Prunty JE, Keemink JR, Kelly DJ. Infants show pupil dilatory responses to happy and angry facial expressions. Dev Sci 2021; 25:e13182. [PMID: 34633123 DOI: 10.1111/desc.13182] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/19/2021] [Revised: 08/31/2021] [Accepted: 09/22/2021] [Indexed: 11/29/2022]
Abstract
Facial expressions are one way in which infants and adults communicate emotion. Infants scan expressions similarly to adults, yet it remains unclear whether they are receptive to the affective information they convey. The current study investigates 6-, 9- and 12-month infants' (N = 146) pupillary responses to the six "basic" emotional expressions (happy, sad, surprise, fear, anger, and disgust). To do this we use dynamic stimuli and gaze-contingent eye-tracking to simulate brief interactive exchanges, alongside a static control condition. Infants' arousal responses were stronger for dynamic compared to static stimuli. And for dynamic stimuli we found that, compared to neutral, infants showed dilatory responses for happy and angry expressions only. Although previous work has shown infants can discriminate perceptually between facial expressions, our data suggest that sensitivity to the affective content of all six basic emotional expressions may not fully emerge until later in ontogeny.
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Affiliation(s)
| | | | - David J Kelly
- School of Psychology, University of Kent, Canterbury, UK
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15
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Prunty JE, Keemink JR, Kelly DJ. Infants scan static and dynamic facial expressions differently. INFANCY 2021; 26:831-856. [PMID: 34288344 DOI: 10.1111/infa.12426] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/31/2020] [Revised: 07/02/2021] [Accepted: 07/08/2021] [Indexed: 11/30/2022]
Abstract
Despite being inherently dynamic phenomena, much of our understanding of how infants attend and scan facial expressions is based on static face stimuli. Here we investigate how six-, nine-, and twelve-month infants allocate their visual attention toward dynamic-interactive videos of the six basic emotional expressions, and compare their responses with static images of the same stimuli. We find infants show clear differences in how they attend and scan dynamic and static expressions, looking longer toward the dynamic-face and lower-face regions. Infants across all age groups show differential interest in expressions, and show precise scanning of regions "diagnostic" for emotion recognition. These data also indicate that infants' attention toward dynamic expressions develops over the first year of life, including relative increases in interest and scanning precision toward some negative facial expressions (e.g., anger, fear, and disgust).
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Affiliation(s)
| | | | - David J Kelly
- School of Psychology, University of Kent, Canterbury, UK
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16
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D'Amelio A, Boccignone G. Gazing at Social Interactions Between Foraging and Decision Theory. Front Neurorobot 2021; 15:639999. [PMID: 33859558 PMCID: PMC8042312 DOI: 10.3389/fnbot.2021.639999] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/10/2020] [Accepted: 03/09/2021] [Indexed: 11/30/2022] Open
Abstract
Finding the underlying principles of social attention in humans seems to be essential for the design of the interaction between natural and artificial agents. Here, we focus on the computational modeling of gaze dynamics as exhibited by humans when perceiving socially relevant multimodal information. The audio-visual landscape of social interactions is distilled into a number of multimodal patches that convey different social value, and we work under the general frame of foraging as a tradeoff between local patch exploitation and landscape exploration. We show that the spatio-temporal dynamics of gaze shifts can be parsimoniously described by Langevin-type stochastic differential equations triggering a decision equation over time. In particular, value-based patch choice and handling is reduced to a simple multi-alternative perceptual decision making that relies on a race-to-threshold between independent continuous-time perceptual evidence integrators, each integrator being associated with a patch.
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Affiliation(s)
- Alessandro D'Amelio
- PHuSe Lab, Department of Computer Science, Universitá degli Studi di Milano, Milan, Italy
| | - Giuseppe Boccignone
- PHuSe Lab, Department of Computer Science, Universitá degli Studi di Milano, Milan, Italy
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17
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Keemink JR, Jenner L, Prunty JE, Wood N, Kelly DJ. Eye Movements and Behavioural Responses to Gaze-Contingent Expressive Faces in Typically Developing Infants and Infant Siblings. Autism Res 2020; 14:973-983. [PMID: 33170549 DOI: 10.1002/aur.2432] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/23/2020] [Revised: 09/30/2020] [Accepted: 10/21/2020] [Indexed: 01/01/2023]
Abstract
Studies with infant siblings of children with Autism Spectrum Disorder have attempted to identify early markers for the disorder and suggest that autistic symptoms emerge between 12 and 24 months of age. Yet, a reliable first-year marker remains elusive. We propose that in order to establish first-year manifestations of this inherently social disorder, we need to develop research methods that are sufficiently socially demanding and realistically interactive. Building on Keemink et al. [2019, Developmental Psychology, 55, 1362-1371], we employed a gaze-contingent eye-tracking paradigm in which infants could interact with face stimuli. Infants could elicit emotional expressions (happiness, sadness, surprise, fear, disgust, anger) from on-screen faces by engaging in eye contact. We collected eye-tracking data and video-recorded behavioural response data from 122 (64 male, 58 female) typically developing infants and 31 infant siblings (17 male, 14 female) aged 6-, 9- and 12-months old. All infants demonstrated a significant Expression by AOI interaction (F(10, 1470) = 10.003, P < 0.001, ŋp 2 = 0.064). Infants' eye movements were "expression-specific" with infants distributing their fixations to AOIs differently per expression. Whereas eye movements provide no evidence of deviancies, behavioural response data show significant aberrancies in reciprocity for infant siblings. Infant siblings show reduced social responsiveness at the group level (F(1, 147) = 4.10, P = 0.042, ŋp 2 = 0.028) and individual level (Fischer's Exact, P = 0.032). We conclude that the gaze-contingency paradigm provides a realistically interactive experience capable of detecting deviancies in social responsiveness early, and we discuss our results in relation to subsequent infant sibling development. LAY SUMMARY: We investigated how infant siblings of children with autism spectrum disorder respond to interactive faces presented on a computer screen. Our study demonstrates that infant siblings are less responsive when interacting with faces on a computer screen (e.g., they smile and imitate less) in comparison to infants without an older sibling with autism. Reduced responsiveness within social interaction could potentially have implications for how parents and carers interact with these infants. Autism Res 2021, 14: 973-983. © 2020 International Society for Autism Research and Wiley Periodicals LLC.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jolie R Keemink
- University of Kent, School of Psychology, Keynes College, Canterbury, Kent, UK
| | - Lauren Jenner
- University of Kent, School of Psychology, Keynes College, Canterbury, Kent, UK
| | - Jonathan E Prunty
- University of Kent, School of Psychology, Keynes College, Canterbury, Kent, UK
| | - Nicky Wood
- East Kent Hospitals University NHS Foundation Trust, Canterbury, Kent, UK
| | - David J Kelly
- University of Kent, School of Psychology, Keynes College, Canterbury, Kent, UK
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18
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Eye-Tracking in Infants and Young Children at Risk for Autism Spectrum Disorder: A Systematic Review of Visual Stimuli in Experimental Paradigms. J Autism Dev Disord 2020; 51:2578-2599. [DOI: 10.1007/s10803-020-04731-w] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 02/07/2023]
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19
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An investigation of word learning in the presence of gaze: Evidence from school-age children with typical development or Autism Spectrum Disorder. COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT 2020. [DOI: 10.1016/j.cogdev.2020.100847] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/20/2022]
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20
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Ishikawa M, Senju A, Itakura S. Learning Process of Gaze Following: Computational Modeling Based on Reinforcement Learning. Front Psychol 2020; 11:213. [PMID: 32194471 PMCID: PMC7063100 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2020.00213] [Citation(s) in RCA: 7] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/25/2019] [Accepted: 01/30/2020] [Indexed: 11/29/2022] Open
Abstract
Many studies have explored factors which influence gaze-following behavior of young infants. However, the results of empirical studies were inconsistent, and the mechanism underlying the contextual modulation of gaze following remains unclear. In order to provide valuable insight into the mechanisms underlying gaze following, we conducted computational modeling using Q-learning algorithm and simulated the learning process of infant gaze following to suggest a feasible model. In Experiment 1, we simulated how communicative cues and infant internal states affect the learning process of gaze following. The simulation indicated that the model in which communicative cues enhance infant internal states is the most feasible to explain the infant learning process. In Experiment 2, we simulated how individual differences in motivation for communication affect the learning process. The results showed that low motivation for communication can delay the learning process and decrease the frequency of gaze following. These simulations suggest that communicative cues may enhance infants' internal states and promote the development of gaze following. Also, initial social motivation may affect the learning process of social behaviors in the long term.
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Affiliation(s)
- Mitsuhiko Ishikawa
- Department of Psychology, Graduate School of Letters, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan
- Japan Society for the Promotion of Science, Tokyo, Japan
| | - Atsushi Senju
- Centre for Brain and Cognitive Development, Birkbeck, University of London, London, United Kingdom
| | - Shoji Itakura
- Department of Psychology, Graduate School of Letters, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan
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21
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Parsons JP, Bedford R, Jones EJH, Charman T, Johnson MH, Gliga T. Gaze Following and Attention to Objects in Infants at Familial Risk for ASD. Front Psychol 2019; 10:1799. [PMID: 31481909 PMCID: PMC6710391 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2019.01799] [Citation(s) in RCA: 6] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/12/2019] [Accepted: 07/19/2019] [Indexed: 12/12/2022] Open
Abstract
Reduced gaze following has been associated previously with lower language scores in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Here, we use eye-tracking in a controlled experimental setting to investigate whether gaze following and attention distribution during a word learning task associate with later developmental and clinical outcomes in a population of infants at familial risk for ASD. Fifteen-month-old infants (n = 124; n = 101 with familial risk) watched an actress repeatedly gaze toward and label one of two objects present in front of her. We show that infants who later developed ASD followed gaze as frequently as typically developing peers but spent less time engaged with either object. Moreover, more time spent on faces and less on objects was associated with lower concurrent or later verbal abilities, but not with later symptom severity. No outcome group showed evidence for word learning. Thus, atypical distribution of attention rather than poor gaze following is a limiting factor for language development in infants at familial risk for ASD.
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Affiliation(s)
- Janet P. Parsons
- Centre for Brain and Cognitive Development, Birkbeck, University of London, London, United Kingdom
| | - Rachael Bedford
- Biostatistics Department, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience, King’s College London, London, United Kingdom
| | - Emily J. H. Jones
- Centre for Brain and Cognitive Development, Birkbeck, University of London, London, United Kingdom
| | - Tony Charman
- Department of Psychology, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience, King’s College London, London, United Kingdom
| | - Mark H. Johnson
- Centre for Brain and Cognitive Development, Birkbeck, University of London, London, United Kingdom
- Department of Psychology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, United Kingdom
| | - Teodora Gliga
- Centre for Brain and Cognitive Development, Birkbeck, University of London, London, United Kingdom
- Department of Psychology, University of East Anglia, Norwich, United Kingdom
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22
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Liu GH, Huang LS, Qian QF, Wang YX, Ge P. [Curative effect of progressively integrated sandplay therapy on core symptoms and sleep management in preschool children with mild-to-moderate autism spectrum disorder]. ZHONGGUO DANG DAI ER KE ZA ZHI = CHINESE JOURNAL OF CONTEMPORARY PEDIATRICS 2019; 21:743-748. [PMID: 31416496 PMCID: PMC7389896 DOI: 10.7499/j.issn.1008-8830.2019.08.002] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/16/2019] [Accepted: 04/30/2019] [Indexed: 06/10/2023]
Abstract
OBJECTIVE To explore the curative effect of progressively integrated sandplay therapy on core symptoms and sleep management in preschool children with mild-to-moderate autism spectrum disorder (ASD). METHODS A total of 50 mild-to-moderate ASD preschool children were randomly divided into an experimental group (n=25) and a control group (n=25). The control group was treated with structured teaching and auditory integration training (AIT). Based on these, the experimental group was treated with progressively integrated sandplay therapy. The Autism Behavior Checklist (ABC), Children Autism Rating Scale (CARS), Social Responsiveness Scale (SRS), Children's Sleep Habit Questionnaire (CSHQ) and emotion recognition tools were used to evaluate the overall curative effect before treatment and 3 months after treatment. RESULTS The experimental group had significantly lower scores of feeling, social interaction, somatic motor, language factor, total ABC and total CARS than the control group (P<0.05). The experimental group had also significantly lower scores of social cognition, social communication, social motivation, autistic behavior factor and total SRS than the control group (P<0.05). The experimental group had a significantly higher accurate rate of recognition of the upper facial expression and lower facial expression than the control group (P<0.05). The experimental group had significantly lower scores of bedtime resistance, sleep onset, sleep duration, night waking, daytime sleepiness, and total CSHQ than the control group (P<0.05). The experimental group had significantly reduced themes of wounding and significantly increased themes of healing after sandplay therapy (P<0.05). CONCLUSIONS Progressively integrated sandplay therapy can effectively improve the core symptoms and sleep quality of preschool children with mild-to-moderate ASD, which can be used as an early rehabilitation measure.
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Affiliation(s)
- Gui-Hua Liu
- Department of Child Healthcare Centre, Fujian Provincial Maternity and Children's Hospital/Affiliated Hospital of Fujian Medical University, Fuzhou 350001, China.
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23
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Liu GH, Huang LS, Qian QF, Wang YX, Ge P. [Curative effect of progressively integrated sandplay therapy on core symptoms and sleep management in preschool children with mild-to-moderate autism spectrum disorder]. ZHONGGUO DANG DAI ER KE ZA ZHI = CHINESE JOURNAL OF CONTEMPORARY PEDIATRICS 2019; 21:743-748. [PMID: 31416496 PMCID: PMC7389896] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/16/2019] [Accepted: 04/30/2019] [Indexed: 11/04/2023]
Abstract
OBJECTIVE To explore the curative effect of progressively integrated sandplay therapy on core symptoms and sleep management in preschool children with mild-to-moderate autism spectrum disorder (ASD). METHODS A total of 50 mild-to-moderate ASD preschool children were randomly divided into an experimental group (n=25) and a control group (n=25). The control group was treated with structured teaching and auditory integration training (AIT). Based on these, the experimental group was treated with progressively integrated sandplay therapy. The Autism Behavior Checklist (ABC), Children Autism Rating Scale (CARS), Social Responsiveness Scale (SRS), Children's Sleep Habit Questionnaire (CSHQ) and emotion recognition tools were used to evaluate the overall curative effect before treatment and 3 months after treatment. RESULTS The experimental group had significantly lower scores of feeling, social interaction, somatic motor, language factor, total ABC and total CARS than the control group (P<0.05). The experimental group had also significantly lower scores of social cognition, social communication, social motivation, autistic behavior factor and total SRS than the control group (P<0.05). The experimental group had a significantly higher accurate rate of recognition of the upper facial expression and lower facial expression than the control group (P<0.05). The experimental group had significantly lower scores of bedtime resistance, sleep onset, sleep duration, night waking, daytime sleepiness, and total CSHQ than the control group (P<0.05). The experimental group had significantly reduced themes of wounding and significantly increased themes of healing after sandplay therapy (P<0.05). CONCLUSIONS Progressively integrated sandplay therapy can effectively improve the core symptoms and sleep quality of preschool children with mild-to-moderate ASD, which can be used as an early rehabilitation measure.
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Affiliation(s)
- Gui-Hua Liu
- Department of Child Healthcare Centre, Fujian Provincial Maternity and Children's Hospital/Affiliated Hospital of Fujian Medical University, Fuzhou 350001, China.
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24
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Classical social reward signatures in infants with later ASD. Behav Brain Sci 2019. [DOI: 10.1017/s0140525x18002492] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/06/2022]
Abstract
Abstract
Autistic individuals can be socially motivated. We disagree with the idea that self-report is sufficient to understand their social drive. Instead, we underscore evidence for typical non-verbal signatures of social reward during the early development of autistic individuals. Instead of focusing on whether or not social motivation is typical, research should investigate the factors that modulate social drives.
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25
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Eye-Tracking Research in Autism Spectrum Disorder: What Are We Measuring and for What Purposes? CURRENT DEVELOPMENTAL DISORDERS REPORTS 2019. [DOI: 10.1007/s40474-019-00158-w] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/26/2022]
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26
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Matsuda S, Omori T, McCleery JP, Yamamoto J. Comparing Reinforcement Values of Facial Expressions: An Eye-Tracking Study. PSYCHOLOGICAL RECORD 2019. [DOI: 10.1007/s40732-019-00330-z] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 10/27/2022]
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27
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[Clinical effect of integrated sandplay therapy in children with Asperger syndrome]. ZHONGGUO DANG DAI ER KE ZA ZHI = CHINESE JOURNAL OF CONTEMPORARY PEDIATRICS 2019; 21. [PMID: 30907346 PMCID: PMC7389368 DOI: 10.7499/j.issn.1008-8830.2019.03.009] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 01/23/2023]
Abstract
OBJECTIVE To study the clinical effect of integrated sandplay therapy in preschool children with Asperger syndrome (AS). METHODS A total of 44 preschool children with AS were randomly divided into an experimental group and a control group, with 22 children in each group. The children in the control group were given routine training, and those in the experimental group were given integrated sandplay therapy in addition to the routine training. The treatment response was assess by the Social Responsiveness Scale (SRS), emotional recognition tools and changes in sandplay theme characteristics after 6 months of treatment. RESULTS Before intervention, there were no significant differences between the two groups in the total score of SRS, the score of each factor of SRS, and correct rates of facial expression recognition of the upright position, inverted position, upper face and lower face (P>0.05). After 6 months of intervention, both groups had significant reductions in the total score of SRS and the score of each factor of SRS (P<0.01); the control group had significant increases in the correct rates of facial expression recognition of all positions except the upright position (P<0.05), while the experimental group had significant increases in the correct rates of facial expression recognition of all positions (P<0.05). Compared with the control group after intervention, the experimental group had significantly lower total score of SRS and scores of all factors of SRS except social perception (P<0.01) and significantly higher correct rates of facial expression recognition of all positions (P<0.01). The experimental group had a significant change in the number of sandplay theme characteristics after intervention (P<0.01). CONCLUSIONS Integrated sandplay therapy can improve social responsiveness and emotion recognition ability in preschool children with AS.
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28
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Cañigueral R, Hamilton AFDC. The Role of Eye Gaze During Natural Social Interactions in Typical and Autistic People. Front Psychol 2019; 10:560. [PMID: 30930822 PMCID: PMC6428744 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00560] [Citation(s) in RCA: 47] [Impact Index Per Article: 9.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/19/2018] [Accepted: 02/28/2019] [Indexed: 12/13/2022] Open
Abstract
Social interactions involve complex exchanges of a variety of social signals, such as gaze, facial expressions, speech and gestures. Focusing on the dual function of eye gaze, this review explores how the presence of an audience, communicative purpose and temporal dynamics of gaze allow interacting partners to achieve successful communication. First, we focus on how being watched modulates social cognition and behavior. We then show that the study of interpersonal gaze processing, particularly gaze temporal dynamics, can provide valuable understanding of social behavior in real interactions. We propose that the Interpersonal Gaze Processing model, which combines both sensing and signaling functions of eye gaze, provides a framework to make sense of gaze patterns in live interactions. Finally, we discuss how autistic individuals process the belief in being watched and interpersonal dynamics of gaze, and suggest that systematic manipulation of factors modulating gaze signaling can reveal which aspects of social eye gaze are challenging in autism.
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Affiliation(s)
- Roser Cañigueral
- Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, Division of Psychology and Language Sciences, University College London, London, United Kingdom
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29
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Li GK, Ge P, Liu GH, Huang XX, Lu GB, Wang YX, Qian QF, Ou P, Xu YY. [Clinical effect of integrated sandplay therapy in children with Asperger syndrome]. ZHONGGUO DANG DAI ER KE ZA ZHI = CHINESE JOURNAL OF CONTEMPORARY PEDIATRICS 2019; 21:234-238. [PMID: 30907346 PMCID: PMC7389368] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/22/2018] [Accepted: 12/28/2018] [Indexed: 11/04/2023]
Abstract
OBJECTIVE To study the clinical effect of integrated sandplay therapy in preschool children with Asperger syndrome (AS). METHODS A total of 44 preschool children with AS were randomly divided into an experimental group and a control group, with 22 children in each group. The children in the control group were given routine training, and those in the experimental group were given integrated sandplay therapy in addition to the routine training. The treatment response was assess by the Social Responsiveness Scale (SRS), emotional recognition tools and changes in sandplay theme characteristics after 6 months of treatment. RESULTS Before intervention, there were no significant differences between the two groups in the total score of SRS, the score of each factor of SRS, and correct rates of facial expression recognition of the upright position, inverted position, upper face and lower face (P>0.05). After 6 months of intervention, both groups had significant reductions in the total score of SRS and the score of each factor of SRS (P<0.01); the control group had significant increases in the correct rates of facial expression recognition of all positions except the upright position (P<0.05), while the experimental group had significant increases in the correct rates of facial expression recognition of all positions (P<0.05). Compared with the control group after intervention, the experimental group had significantly lower total score of SRS and scores of all factors of SRS except social perception (P<0.01) and significantly higher correct rates of facial expression recognition of all positions (P<0.01). The experimental group had a significant change in the number of sandplay theme characteristics after intervention (P<0.01). CONCLUSIONS Integrated sandplay therapy can improve social responsiveness and emotion recognition ability in preschool children with AS.
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Affiliation(s)
- Guo-Kai Li
- Department of Child Healthcare Center, Fujian Provincial Maternity and Children's Hospital, Fujian Medical University, Fuzhou 350001, China.
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30
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Hamilton A, Pelphrey K. Sensory and social features of autism - can they be integrated? Dev Cogn Neurosci 2018; 29:1-3. [PMID: 29563025 PMCID: PMC6987863 DOI: 10.1016/j.dcn.2018.02.009] [Citation(s) in RCA: 6] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 01/06/2023] Open
Affiliation(s)
| | - Kevin Pelphrey
- Autism & Neurodevelopmental Disorders Institute, The George Washington University & Children's National Health System
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