Motion Perception and Social Cognition in Autism: Speed Selective Impairments in Socio-Conceptual Processing?

Aim: Research on Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) has mainly focused on the study of social behavioral deficits (e.g. imitation, eye gaze, play, etc.). These studies have emphasized the high-level impairments that lead to abnormal social interaction in ASD. However, as important as the study of social behavior in ASD, is research on lower-level processes that might contribute to the emergence and development of the atypical social behaviors that characterize this condition. Perceptual differences constitute one such factor. Here, we aim to investigate the possible influence of specific visual motion perception deficits in conceptual processing.Materials and Methods: We compared the performance of children with ASD, with that of children with moderate to severe learning disorders (MLD) or typical development (TD) on a series of computerized tasks. These tasks assessed motion detection in non-social and socially embedded backgrounds or contexts.Results: The results provide evidence for speed-selective impairments in processing socially embedded targets in ASD.Conclusions: Based on these findings, we suggest that low-level perceptual deficits might play an important role in the development of social impairments

Figurative language processing in atypical populations: the ASD perspective

This document is protected by copyright and was first published by Frontiers. All rights reserved. It is reproduced with permissionThis paper is intended to provide a critical overview of experimental and clinical research documenting problems in figurative language processing in atypical populations with a focus on the Autistic Spectrum. Research in the comprehension and processing of figurative language in autism invariably documents problems in this area. The greater paradox is that even at the higher end of the spectrum or in the cases of linguistically talented individuals with Asperger syndrome, where structural language competence is intact, problems with extended language persist. If we assume that figurative and extended uses of language essentially depend on the perception and processing of more concrete core concepts and phenomena, the commonly observed failure in atypical populations to understand figurative language remains a puzzle. Various accounts have been offered to explain this issue, ranging from linking potential failure directly to overall structural language competence (Norbury, 2005; Brock et al., 2008) to right-hemispheric involvement (Gold and Faust, 2010). We argue that the dissociation between structural language and figurative language competence in autism should be sought in more general cognitive mechanisms and traits in the autistic phenotype (e.g., in terms of weak central coherence, Vulchanova et al., 2012b), as well as failure at on-line semantic integration with increased complexity and diversity of the stimuli (Coulson and Van Petten, 2002). This perspective is even more compelling in light of similar problems in a number of conditions, including both acquired (e.g., Aphasia) and developmental disorders (Williams Syndrome). This dissociation argues against a simple continuity view of language interpretation

Spatial navigation, episodic memory, episodic future thinking, and theory of mind in children with autism spectrum disorder: evidence for impairments in mental simulation?

This study explored spatial navigation alongside several other cognitive abilities that are thought to share common underlying neurocognitive mechanisms (e.g., the capacity for self-projection, scene construction, or mental simulation), and which we hypothesized may be impaired in autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Twenty intellectually high-functioning children with ASD (with a mean age of ~8 years) were compared to 20 sex, age, IQ, and language ability matched typically developing children on a series of tasks to assess spatial navigation, episodic memory, episodic future thinking (also known as episodic foresight or prospection), theory of mind (ToM), relational memory, and central coherence. This is the first study to explore these abilities concurrently within the same sample. Spatial navigation was assessed using the “memory island” task, which involves finding objects within a realistic, computer simulated, three-dimensional environment. Episodic memory and episodic future thinking were assessed using a past and future event description task. ToM was assessed using the “animations” task, in which children were asked to describe the interactions between two animated triangles. Relational memory was assessed using a recognition task involving memory for items (line drawings), patterned backgrounds, or combinations of items and backgrounds. Central coherence was assessed by exploring differences in performance across segmented and unsegmented versions of block design. Children with ASD were found to show impairments in spatial navigation, episodic memory, episodic future thinking, and central coherence, but not ToM or relational memory. Among children with ASD, spatial navigation was found to be significantly negatively related to the number of repetitive behaviors. In other words, children who showed more repetitive behaviors showed poorer spatial navigation. The theoretical and practical implications of the results are discussed

Spatial navigation in autism spectrum disorders: a critical review

On the basis of relative strengths that have been attributed to the Autistic cognitive profile, it has been suggested by a number of theorists that people with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) excel at spatial navigational tasks. However, many of these claims have been made in the absence of a close inspection of extant data in the scientific literature, let alone anecdotal reports of daily navigational experiences. The present review gathers together published studies that have attempted to explicitly address functional components of navigation in ASD populations, including assays of wayfinding, large-scale search, and path integration. This inspection reveals a pattern of apparent strengths and weaknesses in navigational abilities, thus illustrating the necessity for a more measured and comprehensive approach to the understanding of spatial behaviour in ASD

We can work it out: an enactive look at cooperation

The past years have seen an increasing debate on cooperation and its unique human character. Philosophers and psychologists have proposed that cooperative activities are characterized by shared goals to which participants are committed through the ability to understand each other’s intentions. Despite its popularity, some serious issues arise with this approach to cooperation. First, one may challenge the assumption that high-level mental processes are necessary for engaging in acting cooperatively. If they are, then how do agents that do not possess such ability (preverbal children, or children with autism who are often claimed to be mind-blind) engage in cooperative exchanges, as the evidence suggests? Secondly, to define cooperation as the result of two de-contextualized minds reading each other’s intentions may fail to fully acknowledge the complexity of situated, interactional dynamics and the interplay of variables such as the participants’ relational and personal history and experience. In this paper we challenge such accounts of cooperation, calling for an embodied approach that sees cooperation not only as an individual attitude toward the other, but also as a property of interaction processes. Taking an enactive perspective, we argue that cooperation is an intrinsic part of any interaction, and that there can be cooperative interaction before complex communicative abilities are achieved. The issue then is not whether one is able or not to read the other’s intentions, but what it takes to participate in joint action. From this basic account, it should be possible to build up more complex forms of cooperation as needed. Addressing the study of cooperation in these terms may enhance our understanding of human social development, and foster our knowledge of different ways of engaging with others, as in the case of autism