Is he being bad? Social and language brain networks during social judgment in children with autism

Topology of the lateral visual system: The fundus of the superior temporal sulcus and parietal area H connect nonvisual cerebrum to the lateral occipital lobe

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE

Mapping the topology of the visual system is critical for understanding how complex cognitive processes like reading can occur. We aim to describe the connectivity of the visual system to understand how the cerebrum accesses visual information in the lateral occipital lobe.

METHODS

Using meta-analytic software focused on task-based functional MRI studies, an activation likelihood estimation (ALE) of the visual network was created. Regions of interest corresponding to the cortical parcellation scheme previously published under the Human Connectome Project were co-registered onto the ALE to identify the hub-like regions of the visual network. Diffusion Spectrum Imaging-based fiber tractography was performed to determine the structural connectivity of these regions with extraoccipital cortices.

RESULTS

The fundus of the superior temporal sulcus (FST) and parietal area H (PH) were identified as hub-like regions for the visual network. FST and PH demonstrated several areas of coactivation beyond the occipital lobe and visual network. Furthermore, these parcellations were highly interconnected with other cortical regions throughout extraoccipital cortices related to their nonvisual functional roles. A cortical model demonstrating connections to these hub-like areas was created.

CONCLUSIONS

FST and PH are two hub-like areas that demonstrate extensive functional coactivation and structural connections to nonvisual cerebrum. Their structural interconnectedness with language cortices along with the abnormal activation of areas commonly located in the temporo-occipital region in dyslexic individuals suggests possible important roles of FST and PH in the integration of information related to language and reading. Future studies should refine our model by examining the functional roles of these hub areas and their clinical significance.

Emotional descriptions increase accidental harm punishment and its cortico-limbic signatures during moral judgment in autism

Individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) present difficulties in integrating mental state information in complex moral tasks. Yet, ASD research has not examined whether this process is influenced by emotions, let alone while capturing its neural bases. We investigated how language-induced emotions modulate intent-based moral judgment in ASD. In a fMRI task, 30 adults with ASD and 27 neurotypical controls read vignettes whose protagonists commit harm either accidentally or intentionally, and then decided how much punishment the protagonist deserved. Emotional content was manipulated across scenarios through the use of graphic language (designed to trigger arousing negative responses) vs. plain (just-the-facts, emotionless) language. Off-line functional connectivity correlates of task performance were also analyzed. In ASD, emotional (graphic) descriptions amplified punishment ratings of accidental harms, associated with increased activity in fronto-temporo-limbic, precentral, and postcentral/supramarginal regions (critical for emotional and empathic processes), and reduced connectivity among the orbitofrontal cortex and the angular gyrus (involved in mentalizing). Language manipulation did not influence intentional harm processing in ASD. In conclusion, in arousing and ambiguous social situations that lack intentionality clues (i.e. graphic accidental harm scenarios), individuals with ASD would misuse their emotional responses as the main source of information to guide their moral decisions. Conversely, in face of explicit harmful intentions, they would be able to compensate their socioemotional alterations and assign punishment through non-emotional pathways. Despite limitations, such as the small sample size and low ecological validity of the task, results of the present study proved reliable and have relevant theoretical and translational implications.

Differential mirror neuron system (MNS) activation during action observation with and without social-emotional components in autism: a meta-analysis of neuroimaging studies

Background

Impaired imitation has been found to be an important factor contributing to social communication deficits in individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). It has been hypothesized that the neural correlate of imitation, the mirror neuron system (MNS), is dysfunctional in ASD, resulting in imitation impairment as one of the key behavioral manifestations in ASD. Previous MNS studies produced inconsistent results, leaving the debate of whether “broken” mirror neurons in ASD are unresolved.

Methods

This meta-analysis aimed to explore the differences in MNS activation patterns between typically developing (TD) and ASD individuals when they observe biological motions with or without social-emotional components. Effect size signed differential mapping (ES-SDM) was adopted to synthesize the available fMRI data.

Results

ES-SDM analysis revealed hyperactivation in the right inferior frontal gyrus and left supplementary motor area in ASD during observation of biological motions. Subgroup analysis of experiments involving the observation of stimuli with or without emotional component revealed hyperactivation in the left inferior parietal lobule and left supplementary motor during action observation without emotional components, whereas hyperactivation of the right inferior frontal gyrus was found during action observation with emotional components in ASD. Subgroup analyses of age showed hyperactivation of the bilateral inferior frontal gyrus in ASD adolescents, while hyperactivation in the right inferior frontal gyrus was noted in ASD adults. Meta-regression within ASD individuals indicated that the right cerebellum crus I activation increased with age, while the left inferior temporal gyrus activation decreased with age.

Limitations

This meta-analysis is limited in its generalization of the findings to individuals with ASD by the restricted age range, heterogeneous study sample, and the large within-group variation in MNS activation patterns during object observation. Furthermore, we only included action observation studies which might limit the generalization of our results to the imitation deficits in ASD. In addition, the relatively small sample size for individual studies might also potentially overestimate the effect sizes.

Conclusion

The MNS is impaired in ASD. The abnormal activation patterns were found to be modulated by the nature of stimuli and age, which might explain the contradictory results from earlier studies on the “broken mirror neuron” debate.

Neural Correlates of Social Perception in Children with Autism: Local versus Global Preferences

The Weak Central Coherence account of autism spectrum disorders posits that individuals with ASD utilize a detail-oriented information processing bias. While this local bias is helpful in visual search tasks, ASD individuals falter in social cognition tasks where coherence is advantageous. The present study examined the neural correlates of Weak Central Coherence in ASD during visual and social processing. Fifteen ASD and sixteen typically developing children/adolescents completed a social/visual information processing task in an fMRI scanner. The stimuli consisted of human characters, composed of geometrical shapes, displaying different emotions. In the locally oriented Shape condition, participants indicated whether a given shape was present in a figure. In the Emotion condition, participants identified the emotion conveyed by the character in the figure at the global level. Whole-brain within- and between-group activation and seed-to-voxel functional connectivity analyses were conducted in SPM12 and the CONN toolbox. The ASD group was significantly faster in shape identification, but less accurate in emotion identification. The TD group showed significantly increased areas of activity over the ASD group in the Shape task in regions associated with executive control, such as the medial prefrontal cortex and middle frontal gyrus, suggesting increased interference from the global/social information. During the Emotion condition, the ASD group showed decreased connectivity between frontal and posterior regions and between body perception and motor networks, suggesting a possible difference in mirroring. The findings suggest that social cognitive factors, not visual processing biases, underlie the observed behavioral differences.

Differences in frontotemporal dysfunction during social and non-social cognition tasks between patients with autism spectrum disorder and schizophrenia

Although literature evidence suggests deficits in social and non-social cognition in patients with autistic spectrum disorder (ASD) and schizophrenia (SCZ), the difference in neural correlates of the impairments between the two disorders has not been elucidated. We examined brain function in response to a non-social cognition and a social cognition task using functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) in 13 patients with ASD, 15 patients with SCZ, and 18 healthy subjects. We assessed the brain function of participants using a verbal fluency task and an emotional facial recognition task. The patients with ASD showed significantly reduced brain activation in the left frontotemporal area during both tasks compared to healthy subjects. The patients with ASD with larger score in ‘attention to detail’ in the autism spectrum quotient showed lower activation of the left frontotemporal area during the two tasks. The patients with SCZ showed significantly reduced activation, compared to healthy subjects, and greater activation, compared to patients with ASD, in the area during the verbal fluency task. The patients with SCZ with more severe symptoms had lower brain activation during the task in this area. Our results suggest that two distinct areas are involved in the distinctive brain pathophysiology relevant to cognitive processing in patients with ASD and SCZ.

Different aberrant mentalizing networks in males and females with autism spectrum disorders: Evidence from resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging

Previous studies have found that individuals with autism spectrum disorders show impairments in mentalizing processes and aberrant brain activity compared with typically developing participants. However, the findings are mainly from male participants and the aberrant effects in autism spectrum disorder females and sex differences are still unclear. To address these issues, this study analyzed intrinsic functional connectivity of mentalizing regions using resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging data of 48 autism spectrum disorder males and females and 48 typically developing participants in autism brain imaging data exchange. Whole-brain analyses showed that autism spectrum disorder males had hyperconnectivity in functional connectivity of the bilateral temporal-parietal junction, whereas autism spectrum disorder females showed hypoconnectivity in functional connectivity of the medial prefrontal cortex, precuneus, and right temporal-parietal junction. Interaction between sex and autism was found in both short- and long-distance functional connectivity effects, confirming that autism spectrum disorder males showed overconnectivity, while autism spectrum disorder females showed underconnectivity. Furthermore, a regression analysis revealed that in autism spectrum disorder, males and females demonstrated different relations between the functional connectivity effects of the mentalizing regions and the core autism spectrum disorder deficits. These results suggest sex differences in the mentalizing network in autism spectrum disorder individuals. Future work is needed to examine how sex interacts with other factors such as age and the sex differences during mentalizing task performance.

Impaired Picture Arrangement subscores (WAIS-III) associated with decreased place orientation and frontal/occipital blood flow in Alzheimer's disease: Implications for social judgment dysfunction. The Osaki-Tajiri Project

Alzheimer's disease (AD) patients manifest not only memory impairment but also deficit of social judgment. However, contrary to frequently recognized deficit, only two neuropsychological tests have been established for assessing "judgment" : the Cognitive Abilities Screening Instrument domain Abstraction & judgment and the Picture Arrangement subscale of WAIS-III. For the former, we previously reported an association with decreased regional cerebral blood flow (rCBF) in the left parietal lobe. Herein, we analyzed the scores of the Picture Arrangement test. Forty-nine AD patients were classified into two groups, i.e., the high and low PA score groups. The ^99mTc-ECD SPECT investigation was performed with the voxel-based analysis using SPM5. The Mini-Mental State Examination subscores of "place orientation" showed a correlation with the PA scores. The low PA score group exhibited significantly decreased rCBFs in the Left Inferior Frontal Gyrus (LIFG), Left Superior Frontal Gyrus (LSFG) and Right Occipital Lobe (ROL), compared with the high PA score group. The ability of PA may be associated with the place orientation, which may be necessary to re-arrange the pictures. The ROL was related to visual recognition. The LSFG may be involved in executive function or "frontal reasoning."

The clinical utility of social information processing theory in assessing and treating offenders with autism spectrum disorder

Purpose

Social deficits are central within conceptualisations of autism spectrum disorder (ASD), and separately linked to offending behaviour. Social problem-solving interventions are often used with offenders, but little research has examined the social information processing (SIP) skills of individuals with ASD and a history of criminal offending behaviours. The paper aims to discuss this issue.

Design/methodology/approach

This conceptual paper will introduce the SIP model, review SIP research as applied to those with ASD and in forensic populations, and further consider the relevance to the assessment and treatment of offenders with ASD.

Findings

Difficulties in all areas of the SIP model are noted in ASD and research suggests these difficulties may be directly linked to behaviour.

Practical implications

It is possible that identifying SIP abilities and deficits could improve the effectiveness of rehabilitation programmes for this group.

Originality/value

This paper reviews the utility of social information models in the offending behaviour of people with ASD.

Divergent roles of autistic and alexithymic traits in utilitarian moral judgments in adults with autism

This study investigated hypothetical moral choices in adults with high-functioning autism and the role of empathy and alexithymia in such choices. We used a highly emotionally salient moral dilemma task to investigate autistics' hypothetical moral evaluations about personally carrying out harmful utilitarian behaviours aimed at maximizing welfare. Results showed that they exhibited a normal pattern of moral judgments despite the deficits in social cognition and emotional processing. Further analyses revealed that this was due to mutually conflicting biases associated with autistic and alexithymic traits after accounting for shared variance: (a) autistic traits were associated with reduced utilitarian bias due to elevated personal distress of demanding social situations, while (b) alexithymic traits were associated with increased utilitarian bias on account of reduced empathic concern for the victim. Additionally, autistics relied on their non-verbal reasoning skills to rigidly abide by harm-norms. Thus, utilitarian moral judgments in autism were spared due to opposite influences of autistic and alexithymic traits and compensatory intellectual strategies. These findings demonstrate the importance of empathy and alexithymia in autistic moral cognition and have methodological implications for studying moral judgments in several other clinical populations.

The promise of multi-omics and clinical data integration to identify and target personalized healthcare approaches in autism spectrum disorders

Complex diseases are caused by a combination of genetic and environmental factors, creating a difficult challenge for diagnosis and defining subtypes. This review article describes how distinct disease subtypes can be identified through integration and analysis of clinical and multi-omics data. A broad shift toward molecular subtyping of disease using genetic and omics data has yielded successful results in cancer and other complex diseases. To determine molecular subtypes, patients are first classified by applying clustering methods to different types of omics data, then these results are integrated with clinical data to characterize distinct disease subtypes. An example of this molecular-data-first approach is in research on Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), a spectrum of social communication disorders marked by tremendous etiological and phenotypic heterogeneity. In the case of ASD, omics data such as exome sequences and gene and protein expression data are combined with clinical data such as psychometric testing and imaging to enable subtype identification. Novel ASD subtypes have been proposed, such as CHD8, using this molecular subtyping approach. Broader use of molecular subtyping in complex disease research is impeded by data heterogeneity, diversity of standards, and ineffective analysis tools. The future of molecular subtyping for ASD and other complex diseases calls for an integrated resource to identify disease mechanisms, classify new patients, and inform effective treatment options. This in turn will empower and accelerate precision medicine and personalized healthcare.

Conditional neuroligin-2 knockout in adult medial prefrontal cortex links chronic changes in synaptic inhibition to cognitive impairments

Abnormal activity in the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) is consistently observed in neuropsychiatric disorders, but the mechanisms involved remain unclear. Chronic aberrant excitation and/or inhibition of mPFC neurons were proposed to cause cognitive impairments. However, direct evidence for this hypothesis is lacking because it is technically challenging to control synaptic properties in a chronic and locally restricted, yet specific, manner. Here, we generated conditional knockout (cKO) mice of neuroligin-2 (Nlgn2), a postsynaptic cell-adhesion molecule of inhibitory synapses linked to neuropsychiatric disorders. cKO of Nlgn2 in adult mPFC rendered Nlgn2 protein undetectable after already 2-3 weeks, but induced major reductions in synaptic inhibition after only 6-7 weeks, and caused parallel impairments in anxiety, fear memory and social interaction behaviors. Moreover, cKO of Nlgn2 severely impaired behavioral stimulation of immediate-early gene expression in the mPFC, suggesting that chronic reduction in synaptic inhibition uncoupled the mPFC from experience-dependent inputs. Our results indicate that Nlgn2 is required for continuous maintenance of inhibitory synapses in the adult mPFC, and that chronic impairment of local inhibition disengages the mPFC from its cognitive functions by partially uncoupling the mPFC from experience-induced inputs.

Neural and cortisol responses during play with human and computer partners in children with autism

Children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) exhibit impairment in reciprocal social interactions, including play, which can manifest as failure to show social preference or discrimination between social and nonsocial stimuli. To explore mechanisms underlying these deficits, we collected salivary cortisol from 42 children 8-12 years with ASD or typical development during a playground interaction with a confederate child. Participants underwent functional MRI during a prisoner's dilemma game requiring cooperation or defection with a human (confederate) or computer partner. Search region of interest analyses were based on previous research (e.g. insula, amygdala, temporal parietal junction-TPJ). There were significant group differences in neural activation based on partner and response pattern. When playing with a human partner, children with ASD showed limited engagement of a social salience brain circuit during defection. Reduced insula activation during defection in the ASD children relative to TD children, regardless of partner type, was also a prominent finding. Insula and TPJ BOLD during defection was also associated with stress responsivity and behavior in the ASD group under playground conditions. Children with ASD engage social salience networks less than TD children during conditions of social salience, supporting a fundamental disturbance of social engagement.

A longitudinal analysis of neural regions involved in reading the mind in the eyes

The ability to perceive social intentions from people's eyes is present from an early age, yet little is known about whether this skill is fully developed in childhood or that subtle changes may still occur across adolescence. This fMRI study investigated the ability to read mental states by using an adapted version of the Reading the Mind in the Eyes task within adolescents (aged 12-19 years) over a 2-year test-retest interval. This longitudinal setup provides the opportunity to study both stability over time as well as age-related changes. The behavioral results showed that participants who performed well in the mental state condition at the first measurement also performed well at the second measurement. fMRI results revealed positive test-retest correlations of neural activity in the right superior temporal sulcus and right inferior frontal gyrus for the contrast mental state > control, suggesting stability within individuals over time. Besides stability of activation, dorsal medial prefrontal cortex showed a dip in mid-adolescence for the mental state > control condition and right inferior frontal gyrus decreased linearly with age for the mental state > control condition. These findings underline changes in the slope of the developmental pattern depending on age, even in the existence of relatively stable activation in the social brain network.

Annual research review: Towards a developmental neuroscience of atypical social cognition

As a starting point for our review we use a developmental timeline, starting from birth and divided into major developmental epochs defined by key milestones of social cognition in typical development. For each epoch, we highlight those developmental disorders that diverge from the normal developmental pattern, what is known about these key milestones in the major disorders affecting social cognition, and any available research on the neural basis of these differences. We relate behavioural observations to four major networks of the social brain, that is, Amygdala, Mentalizing, Emotion and Mirror networks. We focus on those developmental disorders that are characterized primarily by social atypicality, such as autism spectrum disorder, social anxiety and a variety of genetically defined syndromes. The processes and aspects of social cognition we highlight are sketched in a putative network diagram, and include: agent identification, emotion processing and empathy, mental state attribution, self-processing and social hierarchy mapping involving social ‘policing’ and in-group/out-group categorization. Developmental disorders reveal some dissociable deficits in different components of this map of social cognition. This broad review across disorders, ages and aspects of social cognition leads us to some key questions: How can we best distinguish primary from secondary social disorders? Is social cognition especially vulnerable to developmental disorder, or surprisingly robust? Are cascading notions of social development, in which early functions are essential stepping stones or building bricks for later abilities, necessarily correct?

Neural bases of Theory of Mind in children with autism spectrum disorders and children with conduct problems and callous-unemotional traits

Individuals with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) have difficulty understanding other minds (Theory of Mind; ToM), with atypical processing evident at both behavioural and neural levels. Individuals with conduct problems and high levels of callous-unemotional (CU) traits (CP/HCU) exhibit reduced responsiveness to others' emotions and difficulties interacting with others, but nonetheless perform normally in experimental tests of ToM. The present study aimed to examine the neural underpinnings of ToM in children (aged 10–16) with ASD (N = 16), CP/HCU (N = 16) and typically developing (TD) controls (N = 16) using a non-verbal cartoon vignette task. Whilst individuals with ASD were predicted to show reduced fMRI responses across regions involved in ToM processing, CP/HCU individuals were predicted to show no differences compared with TD controls. The analyses indicated that neural responses did not differ between TD and CP/HCU groups during ToM. TD and CP/HCU children exhibited significantly greater medial prefrontal cortex responses during ToM than did the ASD group. Within the ASD group, responses in medial prefrontal cortex and right temporoparietal junction (TPJ) correlated with symptom severity as measured by the Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule (ADOS). Findings suggest that although both ASD and CP/HCU are characterized by social difficulties, only children with ASD display atypical neural processing associated with ToM.