Investigating Gaze of Children with ASD in Naturalistic Settings.

BACKGROUND: Visual behavior is known to be atypical in Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD). Monitor-based eye-tracking studies have measured several of these atypicalities in individuals with Autism. While atypical behaviors are known to be accentuated during natural interactions, few studies have been made on gaze behavior in natural interactions. In this study we focused on i) whether the findings done in laboratory settings are also visible in a naturalistic interaction; ii) whether new atypical elements appear when studying visual behavior across the whole field of view. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: Ten children with ASD and ten typically developing children participated in a dyadic interaction with an experimenter administering items from the Early Social Communication Scale (ESCS). The children wore a novel head-mounted eye-tracker, measuring gaze direction and presence of faces across the child's field of view. The analysis of gaze episodes to faces revealed that children with ASD looked significantly less and for shorter lapses of time at the experimenter. The analysis of gaze patterns across the child's field of view revealed that children with ASD looked downwards and made more extensive use of their lateral field of view when exploring the environment. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE: The data gathered in naturalistic settings confirm findings previously obtained only in monitor-based studies. Moreover, the study allowed to observe a generalized strategy of lateral gaze in children with ASD when they were looking at the objects in their environment

Precursors to social and communication difficulties in infants at-risk for autism: gaze following and attentional engagement

Whilst joint attention (JA) impairments in autism have been widely studied, little is known about the early development of gaze following, a precursor to establishing JA. We employed eye-tracking to record gaze following longitudinally in infants with and without a family history of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) at 7 and 13 months. No group difference was found between at-risk and low-risk infants in gaze following behaviour at either age. However, despite following gaze successfully at 13 months, at-risk infants with later emerging socio-communication difficulties (both those with ASD and atypical development at 36 months of age) allocated less attention to the congruent object compared to typically developing at-risk siblings and low-risk controls. The findings suggest that the subtle emergence of difficulties in JA in infancy may be related to ASD and other atypical outcomes

Do Parents Recognize Autistic Deviant Behavior Long before Diagnosis? Taking into Account Interaction Using Computational Methods

BACKGROUND: To assess whether taking into account interaction synchrony would help to better differentiate autism (AD) from intellectual disability (ID) and typical development (TD) in family home movies of infants aged less than 18 months, we used computational methods. METHODOLOGY AND PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: First, we analyzed interactive sequences extracted from home movies of children with AD (N = 15), ID (N = 12), or TD (N = 15) through the Infant and Caregiver Behavior Scale (ICBS). Second, discrete behaviors between baby (BB) and Care Giver (CG) co-occurring in less than 3 seconds were selected as single interactive patterns (or dyadic events) for analysis of the two directions of interaction (CG→BB and BB→CG) by group and semester. To do so, we used a Markov assumption, a Generalized Linear Mixed Model, and non negative matrix factorization. Compared to TD children, BBs with AD exhibit a growing deviant development of interactive patterns whereas those with ID rather show an initial delay of development. Parents of AD and ID do not differ very much from parents of TD when responding to their child. However, when initiating interaction, parents use more touching and regulation up behaviors as early as the first semester. CONCLUSION: When studying interactive patterns, deviant autistic behaviors appear before 18 months. Parents seem to feel the lack of interactive initiative and responsiveness of their babies and try to increasingly supply soliciting behaviors. Thus we stress that credence should be given to parents' intuition as they recognize, long before diagnosis, the pathological process through the interactive pattern with their child

Evaluation of a latency-based competing stimulus assessment (LBCSA)

[EMBARGOED UNTIL 6/1/2023] A competing stimulus assessment (CSA) is used in the treatment of automatically maintained problem behavior to identify items that compete with the sensory consequences that are associated with the targeted problem behavior. The proposed study aims to evaluate a more efficient means of conducting a CSA by evaluating the effectiveness of a latency-based competing stimulus assessment (LBCSA). During the LBCSA, a therapist presented potential competing stimuli to the participants, and contingent on the occurrence of problem behavior the session was terminated. The results of this study indicated that the items identified as long latency to problem behavior were effective in competing with the hypothesized sensory consequences relative to items identified as short latency to problem behavior for two out of three participants. Subsequently, the LBCSA effectively increased the efficiency of evaluating competing stimuli by systematically decreasing the amount of time it took to evaluate these items.Includes bibliographical references

The impact of Autism Spectrum Disorder and alexithymia on judgments of moral acceptability

One’s own emotional response toward a hypothetical action can influence judgments of its moral acceptability. Some individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) exhibit atypical emotional processing, and moral judgments. Research suggests, however, that emotional deficits in ASD are due to co-occurring alexithymia, meaning atypical moral judgments in ASD may be due to alexithymia also. Individuals with and without ASD (matched for alexithymia) judged the moral acceptability of emotion-evoking statements and identified the emotion evoked. Moral acceptability judgments were predicted by alexithymia. Crucially, however, this relationship held only for individuals without ASD. While ASD diagnostic status did not directly predict either judgment, those with ASD did not base their moral acceptability judgments on emotional information. Findings are consistent with evidence demonstrating that decision-making is less subject to emotional biases in those with ASD

THE ITALIAN NETWORK FOR EARLY DETECTION OF AUTISM SPECTRUM DISORDER: RESEARCH ACTIVITIES AND NATIONAL POLICIES

Background: Well-structured monitoring system is crucial to identify interventions for children with Neurodevelopmental Disorders (NDD). Subjects and methods: The NIDA Network enrolled more than 760 at risk for NDD and typically developing infants to detect early signs of NDD. Results: The NIDA Network was born in some Italian regions to engage clinical centers in a research project. It is increasingly turning out to be a national monitoring project well integrated in the Italian National Health System policies. Conclusions: The NIDA Network activities are finalized at diagnosis and interventions to improve quality of life of children with NDD and their families

Eye Gaze and Heart Rate Deceleration as Indices of Attention in Autism: Relations to Anxiety and ASD Symptomology

There is strong evidence that atypical attention patterns are robust indicators of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) in young children. Additionally, anxiety disorders are very prevalent in ASD populations, though the role of anxiety in modulating social attention and threat bias is unclear in children with ASD. While eye gaze methods are typically utilized to measure attention, physiological methods have been deemed a reliable and complementary way to characterize attentional states. As patterns of autonomic dysregulation have been identified in studies of ASD, the use of physiological measures (i.e., heart rate defined sustained attention) is intriguing. The primary goal of the present study was to build upon the visual (eye gaze) and physiological (HRDSA) profiles of attention in children with ASD. The second goal of the study was to clarify the relationship between attention and anxiety in ASD. Participants of this study included 36 preschool-aged children with ASD and 26 typically developing (TD) children. ASD symptomology was evaluated through the Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule-2 (ADOS-2), while anxiety severity was measured with the Spence Preschool Anxiety Scale (SPAS). Results showed that young children with ASD exhibited reduced gaze towards a stranger in comparison to TD controls; and while anxiety was associated with increased eye gaze in the ASD group, the opposite pattern was found in the TD group. Additionally, while eye gaze and HRDSA methods yielded similar results in the TD group, children with ASD spent considerably more time in HRDSA than they did looking at the stranger. These findings suggest that anxiety may impact attention differently in children with ASD. The observed significant correlation between HRDSA and ASD severity highlights the complex physiological nature of the disorder and calls for continued study of physiological attention in young ASD populations