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Limited Attentional Bias for Faces in Toddlers With Autism Spectrum Disorders
Open accessAbstract
CONTEXT: Toddlers with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) exhibit poor face recognition and atypical scanning patterns in response to faces. It is not clear if face-processing deficits are also expressed on an attentional level. Typical individuals require more effort to shift their attention from faces compared with other objects. This increased disengagement cost is thought to reflect deeper processing of these socially relevant stimuli. OBJECTIVE: To examine if attention disengagement from faces is atypical in the early stages of ASD. DESIGN: Attention disengagement was tested in a variation of the cued attention task in which participants were required to move their visual attention from face or nonface central fixation stimuli and make a reactive saccade to a peripheral target. The design involved diagnosis as a between-group factor and central fixation stimuli type as a within-group factor. SETTING: Participants were taken from a cohort of patients at a university-based specialized clinic or from a pool of subjects participating in a prospective study of social cognition in ASD. PARTICIPANTS: Toddlers with ASD (mean age, 32 months [n = 42]) were compared with toddlers with nonautistic developmental delays (mean age, 29 months [n = 31]) and with typically developing toddlers (mean age, 29 months [n = 46]). MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE: Saccadic reaction time. RESULTS: Developmentally delayed and typically developing toddlers had more difficulties disengaging visual attention from faces than toddlers with ASD. This effect was not present in response to nonfacial stimuli. These results suggest that toddlers with ASD are not captivated by faces to the same extent as toddlers without ASD and that this effect is not driven by a generalized impairment in disengagement of attention. CONCLUSION: The results suggest that face-processing difficulties in toddlers with ASD involve disruption of an attentional mechanism that typically supports deeper processing of these highly socially relevant stimuli.
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In the citing paper
“Chawarksa and colleagues have argued that the depth of processing afforded to social stimuli may be atypical in infants with later ASD, causing cascading consequences for subsequent learning [24].”
In the citing paper
“In the hypothesis of reduced depth of processing for face stimuli, toddlers with ASD show more rapid disengagement from a face than an object stimulus [24], are less distracted by the presence of a face in a gaze cuing task [26], and show slowed face learning [22].”
In the citing paper
“Patients with ASD have been shown to have altered gaze patterns and reduced attention to social imagery45–47.”
From Effect of age and autism spectrum disorder on oxytocin receptor density in the human basal forebrain and midbrain (2018) · cites this paper as [46]
In the citing paper
“It is also known that IN-OXT treatment can ameliorate82 the lack of attentional preference for faces46 that is characteristic of patients with ASD.”
From Effect of age and autism spectrum disorder on oxytocin receptor density in the human basal forebrain and midbrain (2018) · cites this paper as [46]
In the citing paper
“It has been shown that infants, toddlers and adolescents with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) all show disrupted patterns of eye movements in response to images/videos of human faces or naturalistic social scenes, including avoidance of the eye region of faces, atypical fixation targets to the nonsocial aspects of social scenes and a lack of attentional bias toward faces, as measured by faster sacc”
From Comparative Perspectives on Oxytocin and Vasopressin Receptor Research in Rodents and Primates: Translational Implications (2016) · cites this paper as [62]
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References 70 · Cited by 191
Research works printed but not linked: 1
- [31]Sparrow SS Balla DA Cicchetti DV Vineland Adaptive Behavior Scales: Interview Edition, Survey Form Manual Circle Pines, MN American Guidance Service 1984
Metadata
- Authors
- Katarzyna, C., Fred, V., & Ami, K.
- Affiliations
- Yale University (US)
- Venue
- Archives of General Psychiatry
- Publisher
- American Medical Association (AMA)
- Published
- 2010-02-01
- Volume
- 67
- Issue
- 2
- Pages
- 178
- ISSN
- 0003-990X (ISSN-L)
- PMC
- PMC4871149
- OpenAlex
- W2111774955
- Cited by
- 191
- References
- 70
- Citations by year
- 2026: 6 · 2025: 5 · 2024: 5 · 2023: 6 · 2022: 8 · 2021: 9 · 2020: 30 · 2019: 5 · 2018: 14 · 2017: 17 · 2016: 14 · 2015: 15 · 2014: 17 · 2013: 17 · 2012: 10
- FWCI
- 7.54
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- bronze
- doi.org
- Locations
- Archives of General Psychiatry (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
- Funders
- National Institute of Mental Health (U54MH066494, I54 MH66494, R01MH087554, P50MH081756)
- Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (P01HD003008)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Autism Spectrum Disorder Research
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Face Recognition and Perception
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Developmental and Educational Psychology › Child and Animal Learning Development
- Keywords
- autism spectrum disorder, toddlers, face processing, attentional bias, attentional disengagement, face recognition (cognition), saccade latency, social cognition, developmental delay
- MeSH terms
- Attention, Autistic Disorder, Child, Preschool, Cognition Disorders, Cues, Face, Female, Fixation, Ocular, Humans, Male, Neuropsychological Tests, Prospective Studies, Reaction Time, Saccades, Severity of Illness Index, Social Perception
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