Children with Autism Detect Targets at Very Rapid Presentation Rates with Similar Accuracy as Adults

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Web End = J Autism Dev Disord (2016) 46:17621772 DOI 10.1007/s10803-016-2705-9

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Web End = Children with Autism Detect Targets at Very Rapid Presentation Rates with Similar Accuracy as Adults

Carl Erick Hagmann1 Bradley Wyble2 Nicole Shea1 Megan LeBlanc1

Wendy R. Kates3 Natalie Russo1

Published online: 22 January 2016 Springer Science+Business Media New York 2016

Abstract Enhanced perception may allow for visual search superiority by individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), but does it occur over time? We tested high-functioning children with ASD, typically developing (TD) children, and TD adults in two tasks at three presentation rates (50, 83.3, and 116.7 ms/item) using rapid serial visual presentation. In the Color task, participants detected a purple target letter amongst black letter dis-tractors. In the Category task, participants detected a letter amongst number distractors. Slower rates resulted in higher accuracy. Children with ASD were more accurate than TD children and similar to adults at the fastest rate when detecting color-marked targets, indicating atypical neurodevelopment in ASD may cause generalized perceptual enhancement relative to typically developing peers.

Keywords Autism RSVP Visual search Attention

Perception Cognition Development

Introduction

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a neurodevelopmental condition characterized by atypical social communication and repetitive or stereotyped interests and patterns of behavior (APA 2013). Although not part of the nosology, studies of individuals with ASD consistently demonstrate the presence of atypical perception, in which individuals with ASD are found to detect and discriminate between sensory inputs more efciently than IQ and age-matched typically developing (TD) individuals. It is not clear, however, exactly what is different about the way that individuals with ASD process visual information, though there has been much speculation (ORiordan 2004; Simmons et al. 2009). Originally, general ndings of impaired holistic processing were considered to lead individuals with ASD to be better at focusing on parts as opposed to whole gestalts (Happ and Frith 2006). Later, this enhanced local processing was found to be related to both detection and discrimination abilities (Mottron et al. 2006). If enhancements in perceptual processing related to detection or...