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Shafer RL, Bartolotti J, Driggers A, Bojanek E, Wang Z, Mosconi MW. Visual feedback and motor memory contributions to sustained motor control deficits in autism spectrum disorder across childhood and into adulthood. RESEARCH SQUARE 2024:rs.3.rs-4831158. [PMID: 39281871 PMCID: PMC11398565 DOI: 10.21203/rs.3.rs-4831158/v1] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 09/18/2024]
Abstract
Background Autistic individuals show deficits in sustained fine motor control which are associated with an over-reliance on visual feedback. Motor memory deficits also have been reported during sustained fine motor control in autism spectrum disorders (ASD). The development of motor memory and visuomotor feedback processes contributing to sustained motor control issues in ASD are not known. The present study aimed to characterize age-related changes in visual feedback and motor memory processes contributing to sustained fine motor control issues in ASD. Methods Fifty-four autistic participants and 31 neurotypical (NT) controls ages 10-25 years completed visually guided and memory guided sustained precision gripping tests by pressing on force sensors with their dominant hand index finger and thumb. For visually guided trials, participants viewed a stationary target bar and a force bar that moved upwards with increased force for 15s. During memory guided trials, the force bar was visible for 3s, after which participants attempted to maintain their force output without visual feedback for another 12s. To assess visual feedback processing, force accuracy, variability (standard deviation), and regularity (sample entropy) were examined. To assess motor memory, force decay latency, slope, and magnitude were examined during epochs without visual feedback. Results Relative to NT controls, autistic individuals showed a greater magnitude and steeper slope of force decay during memory guided trials. Across conditions, the ASD group showed reduced force accuracy (β = .41, R 2 = 0.043, t 79.3 =2.36, p = 0.021) and greater force variability (β=-2.16, R 2 = .143, t 77.1 =-4.04, p = 0.0001) and regularity (β=-.52, R 2 = .021, t 77.4 =-2.21, p = 0.030) relative to controls at younger ages, but these differences normalized by adolescence (age x group interactions). Lower force accuracy and greater force variability during visually guided trials and steeper decay slope during memory guided trials were associated with overall autism severity. Conclusions Our findings that autistic individuals show a greater rate and magnitude of force decay than NT individuals following the removal of visual feedback indicate that motor memory deficits contribute to fine motor control issues in ASD. Findings that sensorimotor differences in ASD were specific to younger ages suggest delayed development across multiple motor control processes.
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LaGasse B, Yoo GE, Hardy MW. Rhythm and music for promoting sensorimotor organization in autism: broader implications for outcomes. Front Integr Neurosci 2024; 18:1403876. [PMID: 39040594 PMCID: PMC11260726 DOI: 10.3389/fnint.2024.1403876] [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: 03/20/2024] [Accepted: 06/05/2024] [Indexed: 07/24/2024] Open
Abstract
Emerging research suggests that music and rhythm-based interventions offer promising avenues for facilitating functional outcomes for autistic individuals. Evidence suggests that many individuals with ASD have music processing and production abilities similar to those of neurotypical peers. These individual strengths in music processing and production may be used within music therapy with a competence-based treatment approach. We provide an updated perspective of how music and rhythm-based interventions promote sensory and motor regulation, and how rhythm and music may then impact motor, social, and communicative skills. We discuss how music can engage and motivate individuals, and can be used intentionally to promote skill acquisition through both structured and flexible therapeutic applications. Overall, we illustrate the potential of music and rhythm as valuable tools in addressing skill development in individuals on the autism spectrum.
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Affiliation(s)
- Blythe LaGasse
- School of Music, Theatre, and Dance, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, CO, United States
| | - Ga Eul Yoo
- Department of Music Therapy, Graduate School, Ewha Womans University, Seoul, Republic of Korea
| | - Michelle Welde Hardy
- School of Music, Theatre, and Dance, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, CO, United States
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Wang LAL, Petrulla V, Zampella CJ, Waller R, Schultz RT. Gross motor impairment and its relation to social skills in autism spectrum disorder: A systematic review and two meta-analyses. Psychol Bull 2022; 148:273-300. [PMID: 35511567 PMCID: PMC9894569 DOI: 10.1037/bul0000358] [Citation(s) in RCA: 22] [Impact Index Per Article: 11.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 02/04/2023]
Abstract
Gross motor ability is associated with profound differences in how children experience and interact with their social world. A rapidly growing literature on motor development in autism spectrum disorder (ASD) indicates that autistic individuals exhibit impairment in gross motor skills. However, due to substantial heterogeneity across studies, it remains unclear which gross motor skills are impaired in ASD, when and for whom these differences emerge, and whether motor and social impairments are related. The present article addressed these questions by synthesizing research on gross motor skills in ASD in two separate meta-analyses. The first examined gross motor deficits in ASD compared to neurotypical (NT) controls, aggregating data from 114 studies representing 6,423 autistic and 2,941 NT individuals. Results demonstrated a significant overall deficit in gross motor skills in ASD (Hedges' g = -1.04) that was robust to methodological and phenotypic variation and was significant at every level of the tested moderators. However, moderation analyses revealed that this deficit was most pronounced for object control skills (i.e., ball skills), clinical assessment measures, and movements of the upper extremities or the whole body. The second meta-analysis investigated whether gross motor and social skills are related in ASD, synthesizing data from 21 studies representing 654 autistic individuals. Findings revealed a modest but significant overall correlation between gross motor and social skills in ASD (r = 0.27). Collectively, results support the conclusion that motor deficits are tied to the core symptoms of ASD. Further research is needed to test the causality and directionality of this relationship. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).
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Affiliation(s)
- Leah A. L. Wang
- Center for Autism Research, The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States,Department of Psychology, University of Pennsylvania
| | | | - Casey J. Zampella
- Center for Autism Research, The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States
| | | | - Robert T. Schultz
- Center for Autism Research, The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States,Department of Psychology, University of Pennsylvania,Department of Psychiatry, Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania,Department of Pediatrics, Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania
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Fukui T, Chakrabarty M, Sano M, Tanaka A, Suzuki M, Kim S, Agarie H, Fukatsu R, Nishimaki K, Nakajima Y, Wada M. Enhanced use of gaze cue in a face-following task after brief trial experience in individuals with autism spectrum disorder. Sci Rep 2021; 11:11240. [PMID: 34045501 PMCID: PMC8160015 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-021-90230-6] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/29/2020] [Accepted: 05/07/2021] [Indexed: 11/11/2022] Open
Abstract
Eye movements toward sequentially presented face images with or without gaze cues were recorded to investigate whether those with ASD, in comparison to their typically developing (TD) peers, could prospectively perform the task according to gaze cues. Line-drawn face images were sequentially presented for one second each on a laptop PC display, and the face images shifted from side-to-side and up-and-down. In the gaze cue condition, the gaze of the face image was directed to the position where the next face would be presented. Although the participants with ASD looked less at the eye area of the face image than their TD peers, they could perform comparable smooth gaze shift to the gaze cue of the face image in the gaze cue condition. This appropriate gaze shift in the ASD group was more evident in the second half of trials in than in the first half, as revealed by the mean proportion of fixation time in the eye area to valid gaze data in the early phase (during face image presentation) and the time to first fixation on the eye area. These results suggest that individuals with ASD may benefit from the short-period trial experiment by enhancing the usage of gaze cue.
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Affiliation(s)
- Takao Fukui
- Department of Rehabilitation for Brain Functions, Research Institute, National Rehabilitation Center for Persons with Disabilities, 4-1 Namiki, Tokorozawa, Saitama, 359-8555, Japan.
- Faculty of Systems Design, Tokyo Metropolitan University, 6-6 Asahigaoka, Hino, Tokyo, 191-0065, Japan.
| | - Mrinmoy Chakrabarty
- Department of Rehabilitation for Brain Functions, Research Institute, National Rehabilitation Center for Persons with Disabilities, 4-1 Namiki, Tokorozawa, Saitama, 359-8555, Japan
- Department of Social Sciences and Humanities, Indraprastha Institute of Information Technology Delhi, New Delhi, India
| | - Misako Sano
- Department of Rehabilitation for Brain Functions, Research Institute, National Rehabilitation Center for Persons with Disabilities, 4-1 Namiki, Tokorozawa, Saitama, 359-8555, Japan
- Information and Support Center for the Persons with Developmental Disabilities, National Rehabilitation Center for Persons with Disabilities, Tokorozawa, Japan
- Occupational Therapy Sciences, Department of Integrated Health Sciences, Graduate School of Medicine, Nagoya University, Nagoya, Japan
| | - Ari Tanaka
- Department of Rehabilitation for Brain Functions, Research Institute, National Rehabilitation Center for Persons with Disabilities, 4-1 Namiki, Tokorozawa, Saitama, 359-8555, Japan
| | - Mayuko Suzuki
- Department of Medical Treatment III (Pediatric and Child Psychiatric Section), Hospital, National Rehabilitation Center for Persons with Disabilities, Tokorozawa, Japan
| | - Sooyung Kim
- Department of Medical Treatment III (Pediatric and Child Psychiatric Section), Hospital, National Rehabilitation Center for Persons with Disabilities, Tokorozawa, Japan
| | - Hiromi Agarie
- Department of Medical Treatment III (Pediatric and Child Psychiatric Section), Hospital, National Rehabilitation Center for Persons with Disabilities, Tokorozawa, Japan
| | - Reiko Fukatsu
- Department of Rehabilitation for Brain Functions, Research Institute, National Rehabilitation Center for Persons with Disabilities, 4-1 Namiki, Tokorozawa, Saitama, 359-8555, Japan
- Department of Medical Treatment III (Pediatric and Child Psychiatric Section), Hospital, National Rehabilitation Center for Persons with Disabilities, Tokorozawa, Japan
| | - Kengo Nishimaki
- Information and Support Center for the Persons with Developmental Disabilities, National Rehabilitation Center for Persons with Disabilities, Tokorozawa, Japan
- Department of Medical Treatment III (Pediatric and Child Psychiatric Section), Hospital, National Rehabilitation Center for Persons with Disabilities, Tokorozawa, Japan
| | - Yasoichi Nakajima
- Department of Rehabilitation for Brain Functions, Research Institute, National Rehabilitation Center for Persons with Disabilities, 4-1 Namiki, Tokorozawa, Saitama, 359-8555, Japan
- National Rehabilitation Center for Persons with Disabilities, Tokorozawa, Japan
- Community Health Care Research Center, Nagano University of Health and Medicine, Nagano, Japan
| | - Makoto Wada
- Department of Rehabilitation for Brain Functions, Research Institute, National Rehabilitation Center for Persons with Disabilities, 4-1 Namiki, Tokorozawa, Saitama, 359-8555, Japan.
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Takamuku S, Ohta H, Kanai C, de C Hamilton AF, Gomi H. Seeing motion of controlled object improves grip timing in adults with autism spectrum condition: evidence for use of inverse dynamics in motor control. Exp Brain Res 2021; 239:1047-1059. [PMID: 33528597 DOI: 10.1007/s00221-021-06046-3] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/15/2020] [Accepted: 01/18/2021] [Indexed: 11/28/2022]
Abstract
Previous studies (Haswell et al. in Nat Neurosci 12:970-972, 2009; Marko et al. in Brain J Neurol 138:784-797, 2015) reported that people with autism rely less on vision for learning to reach in a force field. This suggested a possibility that they have difficulties in extracting force information from visual motion signals, a process called inverse dynamics computation. Our recent study (Takamuku et al. in J Int Soc Autism Res 11:1062-1075, 2018) examined the ability of inverse computation with two perceptual tasks and found similar performances in typical and autistic adults. However, this tested the computation only in the context of sensory perception while it was possible that the suspected disability is specific to the motor domain. Here, in order to address the concern, we tested the use of inverse dynamics computation in the context of motor control by measuring changes in grip timing caused by seeing/not seeing a controlled object. The motion of the object was informative of its inertial force and typical participants improved their grip timing based on the visual feedback. Our interest was on whether the autism participants show the same improvement. While some autism participants showed atypical hand slowing when seeing the controlled object, we found no evidence of abnormalities in the inverse computation in our grip timing task or in a replication of the perceptual task. This suggests that the ability of inverse dynamics computation is preserved not only for sensory perception but also for motor control in adults with autism.
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Affiliation(s)
- Shinya Takamuku
- NTT Communication Science Laboratories, Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation, Atsugi, Kanagawa, Japan.
| | - Haruhisa Ohta
- Medical Institute of Developmental Disabilities Research, Showa University, Setagaya-ku, Tokyo, Japan
| | - Chieko Kanai
- Medical Institute of Developmental Disabilities Research, Showa University, Setagaya-ku, Tokyo, Japan.,Department of Child Development and Education, Wayo Women's University, Ichikawa, Chiba, Japan
| | | | - Hiroaki Gomi
- NTT Communication Science Laboratories, Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation, Atsugi, Kanagawa, Japan
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Evaluation of Overhand Throwing Among College Students With and Without Autism Spectrum Disorder. Adapt Phys Activ Q 2021; 38:43-61. [PMID: 33307534 DOI: 10.1123/apaq.2019-0178] [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: 11/15/2019] [Revised: 04/21/2020] [Accepted: 04/22/2020] [Indexed: 11/18/2022] Open
Abstract
Children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) typically demonstrate deficits in gross motor skills such as the overhand throw. It has not been determined whether such deficits persist into adulthood. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to examine the kinematics and developmental level of overhand throws among young adults with and without ASD. Three-dimensional motion-capture data were collected during overhand throwing trials performed by 20 college students (10 students with ASD). Individuals with ASD demonstrated similar throw duration, stride length, and step width but a longer acceleration phase and slower ball velocity than individuals without ASD. Young adults with ASD also performed the overhand throw with less developmental proficiency than those without ASD. Specifically, individuals with ASD exhibited developmental deficits in the backswing and composite throwing score. Motor skill interventions for individuals with ASD should address throwing skills, with a particular focus on the preparatory phase of the overhand throw.
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Linke AC, Kinnear MK, Kohli JS, Fong CH, Lincoln AJ, Carper RA, Müller RA. Impaired motor skills and atypical functional connectivity of the sensorimotor system in 40- to 65-year-old adults with autism spectrum disorders. Neurobiol Aging 2020; 85:104-112. [PMID: 31732217 PMCID: PMC6948185 DOI: 10.1016/j.neurobiolaging.2019.09.018] [Citation(s) in RCA: 13] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/19/2019] [Revised: 08/16/2019] [Accepted: 09/23/2019] [Indexed: 12/12/2022]
Abstract
Impairments in fine and gross motor function, coordination, and balance in early development are common in autism spectrum disorders (ASDs). It is unclear whether these deficits persist into adulthood and whether they may be exacerbated by additional motor problems that often emerge in typical aging. We assessed motor skills and used resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging to study intrinsic functional connectivity of the sensorimotor network in 40- to 65-year-old adults with ASDs (n = 17) and typically developing matched adults (n = 19). Adults with ASDs scored significantly lower on assessments of motor skills compared with an age-matched group of typical control adults. In addition, functional connectivity of the sensorimotor system was reduced and the pattern of connectivity was more heterogeneous in adults with ASDs. A negative correlation between functional connectivity of the motor system and motor skills, however, was only found in the typical control group. Findings suggest behavioral impairment and atypical brain organization of the motor system in middle-age adults with ASDs, accompanied by pronounced heterogeneity.
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Affiliation(s)
- Annika Carola Linke
- Department of Psychology, The Brain Development Imaging Laboratories, San Diego State University, San Diego, CA, USA
| | - Mikaela Kelsey Kinnear
- Department of Psychology, The Brain Development Imaging Laboratories, San Diego State University, San Diego, CA, USA
| | - Jiwandeep Singh Kohli
- Department of Psychology, The Brain Development Imaging Laboratories, San Diego State University, San Diego, CA, USA
| | - Christopher Hilton Fong
- Department of Psychology, The Brain Development Imaging Laboratories, San Diego State University, San Diego, CA, USA
| | - Alan John Lincoln
- The Department of Clinical Psychology, Alliant International University, San Diego, CA, USA
| | - Ruth Anna Carper
- Department of Psychology, The Brain Development Imaging Laboratories, San Diego State University, San Diego, CA, USA.
| | - Ralph-Axel Müller
- Department of Psychology, The Brain Development Imaging Laboratories, San Diego State University, San Diego, CA, USA
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