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| 2. |
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| 3. |
- Achermann, Sheila, et al.
(author)
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Motor atypicalities in infancy are associated with general developmental level at 2 years, but not autistic symptoms
- 2020
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In: Autism. - : SAGE Publications Ltd. - 1362-3613 .- 1461-7005. ; 24:7, s. 1650-1663
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Atypical motor development has frequently been reported in infants at elevated likelihood for autism spectrum disorder. However, no previous study has used detailed motion capture technology to compare infant siblings of children with autism spectrum disorder and infant siblings with no familial history of autism spectrum disorder. We investigated reaching movements during an interceptive action task in 10-month-old infants using kinematic data with high spatiotemporal resolution. The results indicated that several measures were different in infants at elevated likelihood. However, longitudinal analyses revealed that while specific infant motor measures (e.g. number of movement units) were related to broad measures of general developmental level in toddlerhood, the associations with later autism spectrum disorder symptomatology were not significant. These findings confirm that some aspects of motor functioning are atypical in infants at elevated likelihood for autism spectrum disorder, but provide no support for the view that these issues are specifically linked to autism spectrum disorder symptoms, but may rather reflect neurodevelopment more generally.Lay abstractAtypicalities in motor functioning are often observed in later born infant siblings of children with autism spectrum disorder. The goal of our study was to investigate motor functioning in infants with and without familial history of autism spectrum disorder. Specifically, we investigated how infants catch a ball that is rolling toward them following a non-straight path, a task that requires both efficient planning and execution. Their performance was measured using detailed three-dimensional motion capture technology. We found that several early motor functioning measures were different in infants with an older autistic sibling compared to controls. However, these early motor measures were not related to autistic symptoms at the age of 2 years. Instead, we found that some of the early motor measures were related to their subsequent non-social, general development. The findings of our study help us understand motor functioning early in life and how motor functioning is related to other aspects of development.
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| 4. |
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| 5. |
- Achermann, Sheila, et al.
(author)
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Parents' experiences from participating in an infant sibling study of autism spectrum disorder
- 2020
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In: Research in Autism Spectrum Disorders. - : Elsevier BV. - 1750-9467 .- 1878-0237. ; 69
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Background:Prospective longitudinal studies of infant siblings of children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) play an important role in advancing our knowledge about early developmental pathways in ASD. Despite this clear benefit, currently little is known about potential risks or disadvantages for participating families. As a first step in addressing this issue, we asked parents about their experiences from participating in an infant sibling study.Method:Eighty-eight families responded to a questionnaire examining parents' experiences from participating in an infant sibling study. The questions assessed parents' satisfaction with the study, the child's perceived satisfaction, and the parents' motivation for participating. The study included parents of two groups, (1) infants with an older sibling diagnosed with ASD (HR, high risk, n = 43) and (2) infants with no familial history of ASD (LR, low risk, n = 21).Results:The results indicated that parents are generally positive about study participation and few disadvantages were reported. This pattern was mirrored when splitting parents' responses into the two groups. There was no indication for group differences between parents of infants at high risk and low risk for ASD.Conclusion:Our findings present a first step into understanding parents' experiences from participating in an infant sibling study. Most parents were satisfied with participation in the study and only few disadvantages were reported. Our results have implications for ethical discussions about benefits and risks regarding infant sibling studies in various fields.
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| 6. |
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| 7. |
- Achermann, Sheila
(author)
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Prediction in Typical and Atypical Development
- 2020
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Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic)abstract
- Forming predictions about what is going to happen next is a crucial ability that develops early in life. Theory and some empirical evidence suggest that predictive abilities may be impaired in Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). The overarching aim of this thesis is to investigate early measures of prediction in relation to concurrent and later outcomes in typical and atypical development, with a particular focus on ASD and related behavioral problems.In Study I, we used motion capture technology to examine prospective motor control and its relationship to executive functions in typically developing 18-month-olds. Our findings showed that motor control is associated with executive functioning in infancy.Study II investigated motor control in infants at low and elevated likelihood for ASD and examined how these measures relate to later development. We found group differences as well as similarities in motor control in 10-months-olds with and without a familial history of ASD. Early motor measures were related to general developmental level, but not ASD symptomatology in toddlerhood.Using eye tracking, Study III examined how infants with later ASD and neurotypical infants form predictions about visual object motion. Our findings indicated that infants with later ASD were able to form predictions about object motion and adapt to simple changes in motion patterns, and that their performance did not differ from the performance of neurotypical infants.In Study IV, we surveyed parents about their experiences during participation in an infant sibling study of ASD as a first step to understanding the benefits and risks associated with this type of research. Parents were generally positive about their experiences both from their own perspective as well as, the child’s perspective.This thesis illustrates the potential of using advanced technology, such as motion tracking and eye tracking, to study and compare prediction in typical and atypical development. It points to the important role of prediction and motor control for child development, but fails to find a specific link to ASD.
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| 8. |
- Achermann, Sheila, et al.
(author)
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Updating Expectations about Unexpected Object Motion in Infants Later Diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder
- 2021
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In: Journal of autism and developmental disorders. - : Springer Nature. - 0162-3257 .- 1573-3432. ; 51:11, s. 4186-4198
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- In typical development, infants form predictions about future events based on incoming sensory information, which is essential for perception and goal-directed action. It has been suggested that individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) make predictions differently compared to neurotypical individuals. We investigated how infants who later received an ASD diagnosis and neurotypical infants react to temporarily occluded moving objects that violate initial expectations about object motion. Our results indicate that infants regardless of clinical outcome react similarly to unexpected object motion patterns, both in terms of gaze shift latencies and pupillary responses. These findings indicate that the ability to update representations about such regularities in light of new information may not differ between typically developing infants and those with later ASD.
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| 9. |
- Andersson Konke, Linn, 1984-, et al.
(author)
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Deferred Gratification as a Protective factor for Autistic Symptom-Adaptive Behavior Associations in 3-Year-Olds
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Other publication (other academic/artistic)abstract
- Background: Children with ASD and/or ADHD often struggle with tasks that demand executive functioning (EF) and deferred gratification. However, whether children with a family history of ASD and/or ADHD differ on these types of tasks in comparison to peers with a family history of typical likelihood is not known. In addition, little is known about the specificity of these domains in relation to autistic traits, ADHD traits and adaptive behaviors early in life and whether deferred gratification and strong EF skills may function as protective factors in the trait-adaptive behaviour association.Methods: A total of 77 infant siblings at 3 years of age participated in the study and we examined the effect of type of family history -FH-ASD, FH-ASD/ADHD and family history of typical likelihood FH-TL- on EF performance, deferred gratification skills and adaptive behaviors, as well as specific and shared associations, including moderation effects. Measures included behavioral lab-tasks (common EF and deferred gratification), parent-rated adaptive behavior using VABS, and clinician ratings using ADOS-2 (autistic symptoms) and ADHD DSM-5 Rating Scale (ADHD RS). Results: Lower levels of deferred gratification was specifically related to adaptive behavior, while lower level performance on common EF was specific for ADHD traits and adaptive behavior. Finally, deferred gratification moderated the association between autistic symptoms and adaptive behavior, in that stronger ability to defer gratification attenuated the association between autistic traits and adaptive functions. Conclusions: In terms of specificity, we found unique associations between deferred gratification and autistic traits, and between common EF and ADHD traits. Finally, the results are in line with the idea that strong EF may act as a protective factor for children with an elevated likelihood of ASD and/or ADHD. However, our findings point at more affective than cognitive aspects of EF as particularly important for attenuating the association between autistic traits and adaptive behaviors.
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| 10. |
- Andersson Konke, Linn, 1984-
(author)
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Early Self-Regulation in Infant Siblings : Specific and Shared Associations to Emerging Autism and Co-ocurring ADHD
- 2023
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Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic)abstract
- The overall aim of this thesis was to examine aspects of self-regulation and the emergence of co-occurring autism and ADHD traits early in life, to enhance our understanding of specific and shared mechanisms underlying these conditions. Previous studies have shown that vulnerabilities in temperament and executive functions (EF) are closely related to both conditions, with overlapping as well as specific features associated to each phenotype. However, most previous studies focus on older children, and it is unclear if specific and shared markers are evident already before symptoms of autism and ADHD emerge. By using an infant-sibling design we were able to follow infants with a family history of autism and/or ADHD, before clinical symptoms emerge. Study I and II focused on infant temperament as either predictors of later autistic and/or ADHD traits or as being predicted by familial quantitative traits, to understand specific and shared associations to autistic and ADHD traits. In Study I, we examined if temperament traits in 1.5-year olds predict autism and ADHD traits at 3 years. Parent-rated temperament showed specific associations to autistic or ADHD traits, respectively. We found some overlap in regulation difficulties across both trait domains. In Study II, we explored the possibility to use probands’ autistic and ADHD traits to predict temperament traits in their 10-month old infant siblings (a between-individual design). We found that higher levels of probands’ autistic symptoms were specifically associated to lower levels of infant sibling’s approach, whereas higher levels of proband’s ADHD symptoms were specifically associated to increased activity levels in the infant siblings. Proband autism and ADHD traits thus provide unique information about the infant siblings’ temperament. Study III focused on specific and shared links between executive functions and deferred gratification and concurrent associations to autistic traits, ADHD traits, and adaptive behaviors in 3-year-olds. We found that deferred gratification may function as a protective factor, moderating autistic traits and adaptive behaviors and thus act as a buffer for adaptive behaviors Together, these studies contribute to our understanding of specific and shared early aspects of self-regulation and their associations to autistic and/or ADHD traits.
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| 11. |
- Balkenius, Christian, et al.
(author)
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Pupillary Correlates of Emotion and Cognition : A Computational Model
- 2019
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In: 2019 9th International IEEE/EMBS Conference On Neural Engineering (NER). - : IEEE. - 9781538679210 ; , s. 903-907
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Conference paper (peer-reviewed)abstract
- In addition to controlling the influx of light to the retina, the pupil also reacts as a result of cognitive and emotional processing. This makes it possible to use pupil dilation as an index for cognitive effort and emotional arousal. We show how an extended version of a computational model of pupil dilation can account for pupillary contagion effects where the pupil of an observer dilates upon seeing another person with dilated pupils. We also show how the model can reproduce the effects of cognitive effort in a math exercise. Furthermore, we investigate how the model can account for different explanations for the abnormal pupil response seen in individuals with or at risk for autism spectrum disorder. The reported computer simulations illustrate the usefulness of system-level models of the brain in addressing complex cognitive and emotional phenomena.
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| 12. |
- Bartl-Pokorny, K. D., et al.
(author)
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Eye Tracking in Basic Research and Clinical Practice
- 2013
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In: Klinische Neurophysiologie. - : Georg Thieme Verlag KG. - 1434-0275 .- 1439-4081. ; 44:3, s. 193-198
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Eye tracking is a non-invasive technique based on infrared video technology that is used to analyse eye movements. Such analyses might provide insights into perceptual and cognitive capacities. It is a method widely used in various disciplines, such as ophthalmology, neurology, psychiatry and neuropsychology for basic science, but also clinical practice. For example, recent studies on children who were later diagnosed with autism spectrum disorders revealed early abnormal eye movement patterns in socio-communicative settings; children with dyslexia appeared also to have peculiar eye movement patterns, expressed in longer fixation durations and smaller saccades while reading. Current research using eye tracking systems in combination with neurophysiological and brain imaging techniques will add to a better understanding of cognitive, linguistic and socio-communicative development and in the near future possibly also lead to a broader clinical application of this method.
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| 13. |
- Bolte, Sven, et al.
(author)
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Challenges and Inequalities of Opportunities in European Psychiatry Research The Example of Psychodiagnostic Tool Availability in Research on Early Autism Identification
- 2018
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In: European Journal of Psychological Assessment. - : Hogrefe Publishing Group. - 1015-5759 .- 2151-2426. ; 34:4, s. 270-277
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Europe is diverse in terms of economy, cultures, socio-demography, and languages. A crucial aspect of psychiatric research is the availability of standardized screening, diagnostic, and characterization instruments. We fine-mapped the accessibility of 14 clinical scales and cognitive tests for the assessment of early childhood Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD; e.g., ADOS, ADI-R, SCQ, SRS, CHAT, MESL) within 21 European countries. These tools are essential for internationally competitive early ASD detection research. We identified a considerable variation not only in the availability, but also psychometric standardization, and formal distribution of the instruments between the countries, privileging English speaking, high-income, and highly populated European countries. Absence of country-specific standardization was a problem across many countries, independent of income and size. Findings demonstrate, on a concrete level, the challenges in creating equal early ASD identification research opportunities in Europe, and the need for increased funding for instrument development and validation. We discuss the reasons, implications, and consequences of this inequity and ways of reducing it.
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| 14. |
- Bolte, S., et al.
(author)
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How can clinicians detect and treat autism early? Methodological trends of technology use in research
- 2016
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In: Acta Paediatrica. - : Wiley. - 0803-5253 .- 1651-2227. ; 105:2, s. 137-144
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Research review (peer-reviewed)abstract
- We reviewed original research papers that used quantifiable technology to detect early autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and identified 376 studies from 34 countries from 1965 to 2013. Publications have increased significantly since 2000, with most coming from the USA. Electroencephalogram, magnetic resonance imaging and eye tracking were the most frequently used technologies. Conclusion: The use of quantifiable technology to detect early ASD has increased in recent decades, but has had limited impact on early detection and treatment. Further scientific developments are anticipated, and we hope that they will increasingly be used in clinical practice for early ASD screening, diagnosis and intervention.
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| 15. |
- Bolte, Sven, et al.
(author)
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Infants at risk for autism : a European perspective on current status, challenges and opportunities
- 2013
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In: European Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 1018-8827 .- 1435-165X. ; 22:6, s. 341-348
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Currently, autism cannot be reliably diagnosed before the age of 2 years, which is why longitudinal studies of high-risk populations provide the potential to generate unique knowledge about the development of autism during infancy and toddlerhood prior to symptom onset. Early autism research is an evolving field in child psychiatric science. Key objectives are fine mapping of neurodevelopmental trajectories and identifying biomarkers to improve risk assessment, diagnosis and treatment. ESSEA (Enhancing the Scientific Study of Early Autism) is a COST (European Cooperation in Science and Technology) Action striving to create a European collaboration to enhance the progress of the discovery and treatment of the earliest signs of autism, and to establish European practice guidelines on early identification and intervention by bringing together European expertise from cognitive neuroscience and clinical sciences. The objective of this article is to clarify the state of current European research on at-risk autism research, and to support the understanding of different contexts in which the research is being conducted. We present ESSEA survey data on ongoing European high-risk ASD studies, as well as perceived challenges and opportunities in this field of research. We conclude that although high-risk autism research in Europe faces several challenges, the existence of several key factors (e.g., new and/or large-scale autism grants, availability of new technologies, and involvement of experienced research groups) lead us to expect substantial scientific and clinical developments in Europe in this field during the next few years.
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| 16. |
- Bussu, Giorgia, et al.
(author)
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Manipulation of phasic arousal by auditory cues is associated with subsequent changes in visual orienting to faces in infancy
- 2023
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In: Scientific Reports. - : Springer Nature. - 2045-2322. ; 13:1
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- This eye-tracking study investigated the effect of sound-induced arousal on social orienting under different auditory cue conditions in 5-month-old (n = 25; n = 13 males) and 10-month-old infants (n = 21; n = 14 males) participating in a spontaneous visual search task. Results showed: (1) larger pupil dilation discriminating between high and low volume (b = 0.02, p = 0.007), but not between social and non-social sounds (b = 0.004, p = 0.64); (2) faster visual orienting (b = − 0.09, p < 0.001) and better social orienting at older age (b = 0.94, p < 0.001); (3) a fast habituation effect on social orienting after high-volume sounds (χ2(2) = 7.39, p = 0.025); (4) a quadratic association between baseline pupil size and target selection (b = − 1.0, SE = 0.5, χ2(1) = 4.04, p = 0.045); (5) a positive linear association between pupil dilation and social orienting (b = 0.09, p = 0.039). Findings support adaptive gain theories of arousal, extending the link between phasic pupil dilation and task performance to spontaneous social orienting in infancy.
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| 17. |
- Bussu, Giorgia, et al.
(author)
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The latent structure of emerging cognitive abilities : An infant twin study
- 2023
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In: Intelligence. - : Elsevier. - 0160-2896 .- 1873-7935. ; 99, s. 101771-101771
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- It is well known that genetic factors account for up to 70% of variability in cognition from childhood to adulthood. However, less is known about the first year of life. This study investigated the etiological factors influencing individual variability in different domains of emerging cognitive and motor abilities in early infancy, and to what extent genetic and environmental influences are unique or shared across different domains. We compared multivariate twin models built on scores from the five scales of the Mullen Scales of Early Learning (MSEL) in a community sample of monozygotic and dizygotic twins at 5 months of age (n=567). The results indicated a hierarchical etiological structure whereby a general genetic latent factor accounted for 54% of variance underlying the different domains of emerging cognitive and motor abilities (A=0.54, confidence interval CI=[0; 0.82]). We also found additional genetic influences that were specific to early motor and language development. Unlike previous findings on older children, we did not find significant influences of shared environment on the shared factor (C=0, CI=[0, 0.57]), or any specific scale. Furthermore, influences of unique environment, which include measurement error, were moderate and statistically significant (E=0.46, CI=0.18; 0.81]). This study provides strong evidence for a unitary hierarchical structure across different domains of emerging cognition. Evidence that a single common etiological factor, which we term infant g, contributes to a range of different abilities supports the view that in young infants, intrinsic and general neurodevelopmental processes are key drivers of observable behavioural differences in specific domains.
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| 18. |
- Darki, Fahimeh, et al.
(author)
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T1-Weighted/T2-Weighted Ratio Mapping at 5 Months Captures Individual Differences in Behavioral Development and Differentiates Infants at Familial Risk for Autism from Controls
- 2021
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In: Cerebral Cortex. - : Oxford University Press. - 1047-3211 .- 1460-2199. ; 31:9, s. 4068-4077
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Identifying structural measures that capture early brain development and are sensitive to individual differences in behavior is a priority in developmental neuroscience, with potential implications for our understanding of both typical and atypical populations. T1-weighted/T2-weighted (T1w/T2w) ratio mapping, which previously has been linked to myelination, represents an interesting candidate measure in this respect, as an accessible measure from standard magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) sequences. Yet, its value as an early infancy measure remains largely unexplored. Here, we compared T1w/T2w ratio in 5-month-old infants at familial risk (n = 27) for autism spectrum disorder (ASD) to those without elevated autism risk (n =16). We found lower T1w/T2w ratio in infants at high risk for ASD within widely distributed regions, spanning both white and gray matter. In regions differing between groups, higher T1w/T2w ratio was robustly associated with higher age at scan (range: similar to 4-6.5 months), implying sensitivity to maturation at short developmental timescales. Further, higher T1w/T2w ratio within these regions was associated with higher scores on measures of concurrent developmental level. These findings suggest that T1w/T2w ratio is a developmentally sensitive measure that should be explored further in future studies of both typical and atypical infant populations.
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| 19. |
- Del Bianco, Teresa, et al.
(author)
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The Developmental Origins of Gaze-Following in Human Infants
- 2019
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In: Infancy. - : Wiley. - 1525-0008 .- 1532-7078. ; 24:3, s. 433-454
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- During the first year of life, infants develop the capacity to follow the gaze of others. This behavior allows sharing attention and facilitates language acquisition and cognitive development. This article reviews studies that investigated gaze-following before 12 months of age in typically developing infants and discusses current theoretical perspectives on early GF. Recent research has revealed that early GF is highly dependent on situational constraints and individual characteristics, but theories that describe the underlying mechanisms have partly failed to consider this complexity. We propose a novel framework termed the perceptual narrowing account of GF that may have the potential to integrate existing theoretical accounts.
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| 20. |
- deWit, Tessa, et al.
(author)
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Young children with Autism Spectrum Disorder look differently at positive versus negative emotional faces
- 2008
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In: Research in Autism Spectrum Disorders. - : Elsevier BV. - 1750-9467. ; 2:4, s. 651-659
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- One of the core issues in Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is problematic social interaction, which for an important part is reflected by poor processing of emotional information. Typically, adults show specific viewing patterns while scanning positive and negative emotional expressions in faces. In this study, we investigated whether the same pattern is present in a group of 3- to 6-year-old children with ASD and a 5-year-old control group. We found that although the group with ASD looked less at feature areas of the face (eye, mouth, nose) than the control group, both the children with ASD and the normally developing children displayed differential scanning patterns for faces displaying positive and negative emotions. Specifically, we found increased scanning of the eye region when looking at faces displaying negative emotions. This study shows that, although young children with ASD exhibit abnormal face scanning patterns, they do exhibit differential viewing strategies while scanning positive and negative facial expressions.
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| 21. |
- Dorn, Katharina, et al.
(author)
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Watch and listen – A cross-cultural study of audio-visual-matching behavior in 4.5-month-old infants in German and Swedish talking faces
- 2018
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In: Infant Behavior and Development. - : Elsevier BV. - 0163-6383 .- 1879-0453 .- 1934-8800. ; 52, s. 121-129
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Investigating infants’ ability to match visual and auditory speech segments presented sequentially allows us to understand more about the type of information they encode in each domain, as well as their ability to relate the information. One previous study found that 4.5- month-old infants’ preference for visual French or German speech depended on whether they had previously heard the respective language, suggesting a remarkable ability to encode and relate audio-visual speech cues and to use these to guide their looking behavior. However, French and German differ in their prosody, meaning that perhaps, the infants did not base their matching on phonological or phonetic cues, but on prosody patterns. The present study aimed to address this issue by tracking the eye gaze of 4.5-month-old German and Swedish infants cross-culturally in an intersensory matching procedure, comparing German and Swedish, two same-rhythm-class languages differing in phonetic and phonological attributes but not in prosody. Looking times indicated that even when distinctive prosodic cues were eliminated, 4.5- month-olds were able to extract subtle language properties and sequentially match visual and heard fluent speech. This outcome was the same for different individual speakers for the two modalities, ruling out the possibility that the infants matched speech patterns specific to one individual. This study confirms a remarkably early emerging ability of infants to match auditory and visual information. The fact that the types of information were matched despite sequential presentation demonstrates that the information is retained in short term memory, and thus goes beyond purely perceptual – here-and-now processing.
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| 22. |
- Ekberg, Therese L., et al.
(author)
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Reduced Prospective Motor Control in 10-month-olds at Risk for Autism Spectrum Disorder
- 2016
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In: Clinical Psychological Science. - : SAGE Publications. - 2167-7026 .- 2167-7034. ; 4:1, s. 129-135
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Motor impairments are not a part of the diagnostic criteria for autism spectrum disorder (ASD) but are overrepresented in the ASD population. Deficits in prospective motor control have been demonstrated in adults and older children with ASD but have never before been examined in infants at familial risk for the disorder. We assessed the ability to prospectively control reach-to-grasp actions in 10-month-old siblings of children with ASD (high-risk group, n = 29, 13 female) as well as in a low-risk control group (n = 16, 8 female). The task was to catch a ball rolling on a curvilinear path off an inclined surface. The low-risk group performed predictive reaches when catching the ball, whereas the high-risk group started their movements reactively. The high-risk group started their reaches significantly later than the low-risk group (p = .03). These results indicate impaired prospective motor control in infants susceptible for ASD.
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| 23. |
- Elsner, Claudia, et al.
(author)
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Humans anticipate the goal of other people’s point-light actions
- 2012
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In: Frontiers in Psychology. - : Frontiers Media SA. - 1664-1078. ; 3
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- This eye tracking study investigated the degree to which biological motion information from manual point-light displays provides sufficient information to elicit anticipatory eye movements. We compared gaze performance of adults observing a biological motion point-light display of a hand reaching fora goal object or a non-biological version of the same event. Participants anticipated the goal of the point-light action in the biological motion condition but not in a non-biological control condition. The present study demonstrates that kinematic information from biological motion can be used to anticipate the goal of other people's point-light actions and that the presence of biological motion is sufficient for anticipation to occur.
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| 24. |
- Elsner, Claudia, et al.
(author)
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The motor cortex is causally related to predictive eye movements during action observation
- 2013
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In: Neuropsychologia. - : Elsevier BV. - 0028-3932 .- 1873-3514. ; 51:3, s. 488-492
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- We examined the hypothesis that predictive gaze during observation of other people's actions depends on the activation of corresponding action plans in the observer. Using transcranial magnetic stimulation and eye-tracking technology we found that stimulation of the motor hand area, but not of the leg area, slowed gaze predictive behavior (compared to no TMS). This result shows that predictive eye movements to others' action goals depend on a somatotopical recruitment of the observer's motor system. The study provides direct support for the view that a direct matching process implemented in the mirror-neuron system plays a functional role for real-time goal prediction.
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| 25. |
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| 26. |
- Falck-Ytter, Terje, et al.
(author)
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Brief Report : Lack of Processing Bias for the Objects Other People Attend to in 3-Year-Olds with Autism
- 2015
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In: Journal of autism and developmental disorders. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 0162-3257 .- 1573-3432. ; 45:6, s. 1897-1904
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Whether gaze following-a key component of joint attention-is impaired in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is currently debated. Functional gaze following involves saccading towards the attended rather than unattended targets (accuracy) as well as a subsequent processing bias for attended objects. Using non-invasive eye tracking technology, we show that gaze following accuracy is intact in intellectually low-functioning 3-year-olds with ASD. However, analyses of the duration of first fixations at the objects in the scene revealed markedly weaker initial processing bias for attended objects in children with ASD compared to children with typical development and non-autistic children with developmental delays. Limited processing bias for the objects other people attend to may negatively affect learning opportunities in ASD.
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| 27. |
- Falck-Ytter, Terje, et al.
(author)
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Development During Infancy in Children Later Diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder
- 2020
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In: The Cambridge Handbook of Infant Development. - Cambridge : Cambridge University Press. - 9781108444392 ; , s. 128-154
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Book chapter (other academic/artistic)abstract
- Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a heritable, heterogeneous, and common neurodevelopmental condition defined by impairments in social communication alongside restricted and repetitive behaviors (RRB). ASD is a moving target; its definition has changed dramatically over the years. The first comprehensive clinical descriptions of the condition were given by Leo Kanner and Hans Asperger more than 70 years ago (Asperger, 1944; Kanner, 1943), but it was not before 1980, with the publication of the third edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM) of the American Psychiatric Association that the term autism was introduced as a formal category. At that time, only one criterion related to social interaction was listed (pervasive lack of responsiveness to other people).
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| 28. |
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| 29. |
- Falck-Ytter, Terje, et al.
(author)
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Difficulties maintaining prolonged fixation and attention-deficit/hyperactivity symptoms share genetic influences in childhood
- 2020
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In: Psychiatry Research. - : Elsevier. - 0165-1781 .- 1872-7123. ; 293
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- This study investigated the association between the ability to maintain prolonged (2-minute) fixation on a visual target and ADHD traits in a sample consisting of 120 monozygotic and 120 dizygotic twin pairs, aged 9 to 14 years. More intrusive saccades during the task was associated with higher level of parent-reported ADHD traits. Both intrusive saccades and ADHD symptoms had high heritability estimates, and there was a moderate genetic correlation between number of intrusive saccades and ADHD. This study suggests that inability to maintain ocular fixation for longer times is etiologically linked to ADHD traits in the general population.
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| 30. |
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| 31. |
- Falck-Ytter, Terje, et al.
(author)
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Eye Contact Modulates Cognitive Processing Differently in Children With Autism
- 2015
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In: Child Development. - : Wiley. - 0009-3920 .- 1467-8624. ; 86:1, s. 37-47
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- In humans, effortful cognitive processing frequently takes place during social interaction, with eye contact being an important component. This study shows that the effect of eye contact on memory for nonsocial information is different in children with typical development than in children with autism, a disorder of social communication. Direct gaze facilitated memory performance in children with typical development (n = 25, 6 years old), but no such facilitation was seen in the clinical group (n = 10, 6 years old). Eye tracking conducted during the cognitive test revealed strikingly similar patterns of eye movements, indicating that the results cannot be explained by differences in overt attention. Collectively, these findings have theoretical significance and practical implications for testing practices in children.
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| 32. |
- Falck-Ytter, Terje, et al.
(author)
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Eye tracking in early autism research
- 2013
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In: Journal of Neurodevelopmental Disorders. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 1866-1955 .- 1866-1947. ; 5, s. 28-
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Research review (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Eye tracking has the potential to characterize autism at a unique intermediate level, with links 'down' to underlying neurocognitive networks, as well as 'up' to everyday function and dysfunction. Because it is non-invasive and does not require advanced motor responses or language, eye tracking is particularly important for the study of young children and infants. In this article, we review eye tracking studies of young children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and children at risk for ASD. Reduced looking time at people and faces, as well as problems with disengagement of attention, appear to be among the earliest signs of ASD, emerging during the first year of life. In toddlers with ASD, altered looking patterns across facial parts such as the eyes and mouth have been found, together with limited orienting to biological motion. We provide a detailed discussion of these and other key findings and highlight methodological opportunities and challenges for eye tracking research of young children with ASD. We conclude that eye tracking can reveal important features of the complex picture of autism.
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| 33. |
- Falck-Ytter, Terje
(author)
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Face inversion effects in autism : a combined looking time and pupillometric study
- 2008
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In: Autism research. - : Wiley. - 1939-3806 .- 1939-3792. ; 1:5, s. 297-306
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Previous research has found that in typically developing individuals, behavioral performance declines and electrophysiological brain responses are altered when the face is inverted. Such effects are generally attributed to disruption of configural information. Individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) have been found to show less pronounced inversion effects, a result in line with the view that featural processing of faces is enhanced in ASD. No study has determined if, or how, such local bias is reflected in the eye movements used in face observation. In this eye tracking study, looking time and pupil dilation were investigated during the presentation of upright and inverted faces in preschool children with ASD and typically developing preschoolers. On average, both children with ASD and typically developing children looked less at the face and the eye areas during inverted presentations than during upright presentations. Nevertheless, individuals with ASD had a stronger tendency than typically developing children to look at the same face features during upright and inverted presentations, which is suggestive of a local bias. Pupil dilation, reflecting increased processing load, was larger for inverted than upright faces in the ASD group only, and pupillary inversion effects were stronger in ASD than in typically developing children.
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| 34. |
- Falck-Ytter, Terje, et al.
(author)
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Face scanning distinguishes social from communication impairments in autism
- 2010
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In: Developmental Science. - : Wiley. - 1363-755X .- 1467-7687. ; 13:6, s. 864-875
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- How closely related are the social and communicative impairments in Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD)? Recent findings in typically developing children suggest that both types of impairment are highly heritable but have only moderate behavioural and genetic overlap. So far, their respective roles in social perception are poorly understood. Here we show that when looking at other people’s faces, children with ASD who are better at socio-emotional behaviours than non-verbal communication look more at the eyes, while those with the opposite profile look more at the mouth (Study 1). For the mouth area, a similar pattern was observed for inverted faces, suggesting that information from this area is perceived on a featural basis. In Study 2, we found that when shown a person performing manual actions, ‘eye-lookers’ from Study 1 tended to look most at the face of the actor, while ‘mouthlookers’ from Study 1 tended to look at the action itself (hand ⁄ objects). This result was found in both ASD and typical development. In Study 3, the main finding in Study 1 was replicated in a new sample. Taken together, we interpret these results as supporting the view that the neural systems underlying socio-emotional versus non-verbal communication skills are separable, a finding that has important theoretical and clinical implications. The results also suggest that a similar differentiation of looking behaviour may operate in normal development.
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| 35. |
- Falck-Ytter, Terje, 1979-
(author)
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From Actions to Faces : Studies of Social Perception in Typical and Atypical Development
- 2010
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Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic)abstract
- This thesis consists of three eye-tracking studies of social perception in children. Study I and Study II investigated action perception in typically developing infants and preschoolers with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), respectively. Study III investigated face perception in children with ASD. Do infants come to understand others’ actions by a Mirror Neuron System (MNS) that maps others’ actions onto motor plans for similar actions? In Study I, we measured the eye movements while participants observed video clips of an actor's hand placing toys into a bucket. Adults and twelve-month-old infants looked at the bucket before the hand reached it, predicting the goal of the action. This predictive performance was linked to seeing a hand-object interaction. Six-month-olds failed to predict the goal of the action. The development in prediction skills coincides with the age at which infants learn to perform the action themselves. This supports the view that the MNS forms the basis of important social competences such as predicting others' actions. According to the MNS theory of ASD, a failure to map others’ actions onto motor plans for similar actions underlies the social symptoms defining the disorder. In Study II, children with ASD as well as typically developing children and adults were shown the same stimuli as used in Study I. At odds with the theory, all groups used strikingly similar predictive eye movements in action observation. Gaze was reactive in a self-propelled condition, suggesting that prediction is linked to seeing a hand-object interaction. This study does not support the view that ASD is characterized by a global dysfunction in the MNS. Face processing is another core social competence, and research has suggested that many individuals with ASD have face processing impairments. In Study III, we showed faces to young children with ASD and related their looking performance to their behavioural symptoms. Our findings suggest that the socio-communicative information transmitted from faces is processed in a piecemeal fashion in young children with ASD. Much of the variability in face scanning could be explained by individual differences in socio-communicative skills.
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| 36. |
- Falck-Ytter, Terje
(author)
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Gaze performance during face-to-face communication : A live eye tracking study of typical children and children with autism
- 2015
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In: Research in Autism Spectrum Disorders. - : Elsevier BV. - 1750-9467 .- 1878-0237. ; 17, s. 78-85
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is characterized by socio-communicative impairments, and limited attention to other people's faces is thought to be an important underlying mechanism. Here, non-invasive eye-tracking technology was used to quantify the amount of time spent looking at another person's face during face-to-face communication in children with ASD (n = 13, age 6 years) and age and IQ-matched neurotypical children (n = 27, 6 years). We found that in one context of high ecological relevance - listening to an adult telling a children's story - children with ASD showed a markedly reduced tendency to look at the adult's face. In interactions between typical children and the adult, the amount of gaze to the other's face aligned between the two individuals. No such relation was found when the ASD group interacted with the adult. Despite these differences in the storytelling context, we also observed that social looking atypicalities did not generalize to another and more structured context, implying that social looking cannot not be considered fundamentally disrupted in children with ASD.
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| 37. |
- Falck-Ytter, Terje, et al.
(author)
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Gaze performance in children with autism spectrum disorder when observing communicative actions.
- 2012
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In: Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 0162-3257 .- 1573-3432. ; 42:10, s. 2236-2245
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- The main purpose of this eye tracking study was to map the correlates of gaze performance in a brief test of spontaneous gaze and point-gesture following in young children with autistic disorder (AD), Pervasive developmental disorder-not otherwise specified (PDD-NOS), or typical development (TD). Gaze measures included the children's spontaneous tendency to look at the correct (attended) toy, and the latency of their correct responses. In addition to group differences (AD vs. TD), we found that in AD, accuracy of performance was specifically related to adaptive communication skills. The study also indicated that the latency of correct gaze shifts is related to verbal intelligence. These results have direct implications for our understanding of (responsive) joint attention impairments in AD.
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| 38. |
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| 39. |
- Falck-Ytter, Terje, et al.
(author)
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Human infants orient to biological motion rather than audiovisual synchrony
- 2011
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In: Neuropsychologia. - : Elsevier BV. - 0028-3932 .- 1873-3514. ; 49:7, s. 2131-2135
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Both orienting to audiovisual synchrony and to biological motion are adaptive responses. The ability to integrate correlated information from multiple senses reduces processing load and underlies the perception of a multimodal and unified world. Perceiving biological motion facilitates filial attachment and detection of predators/prey. In the literature, these mechanisms are discussed in isolation. In this eye-tracking study, we tested their relative strengths in young human infants. We showed five-month-old infants point-light animation pairs of human motion, accompanied by a soundtrack. We found that audiovisual synchrony was a strong determinant of attention when it was embedded in biological motion (two upright animations). However, when biological motion was shown together with distorted biological motion (upright animation and inverted animation, respectively), infants looked at the upright animation and disregarded audiovisual synchrony. Thus, infants oriented to biological motion rather than multimodally unified physical events. These findings have important implications for understanding the developmental trajectory of brain specialization in early human infancy.
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| 40. |
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| 41. |
- Falck-Ytter, Terje, et al.
(author)
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Lack of Visual Orienting to Biological Motion and Audiovisual Synchrony in 3-Year-Olds with Autism
- 2013
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In: PLOS ONE. - : Public Library of Science (PLoS). - 1932-6203. ; 8:7, s. e68816-
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- It has been suggested that children with autism orient towards audiovisual synchrony (AVS) rather than biological motion and that the opposite pattern is to be expected in typical development. Here, we challenge this notion by showing that 3-year-old neurotypical children orient to AVS and to biological motion in point-light displays but that 3-year-old children with autism orient to neither of these types of information. Thus, our data suggest that two fundamental mechanisms are disrupted in young children with autism: one that supports orienting towards others' movements and one that supports orienting towards multimodally specified events. These impairments may have consequences for socio-cognitive development and brain organization.
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| 42. |
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| 43. |
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| 44. |
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| 45. |
- Falck-Ytter, Terje
(author)
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Predicting other people's action goals with low-level motor information
- 2012
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In: Journal of Neurophysiology. - : American Physiological Society. - 0022-3077 .- 1522-1598. ; 107:11, s. 2923-2925
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- In support for the direct-matching hypothesis, Ambrosini et al. (2011) recently reported that goal-directed saccades during action observation were modulated by manipulations of basic motor information. This finding indicates that motor programs, activated by low-level visual descriptions of others' actions, are involved in predicting other people's action goals. Here, I put this result into a broader context, review alternative interpretations, and suggest strategies for future studies.
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| 46. |
- Falck-Ytter, Terje, et al.
(author)
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Reduced Orienting to Audiovisual Synchrony in Infancy Predicts Autism Diagnosis at 3 Years of Age
- 2018
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In: Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry. - : Wiley. - 0021-9630 .- 1469-7610. ; 59:8, s. 872-880
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Background: Effective multisensory processing develops in infancy and is thought to be important for the perception of unified and multimodal objects and events. Previous research suggests impaired multisensory processing in autism, but its role in the early development of the disorder is yet uncertain. Here, using a prospective longitudinal design, we tested whether reduced visual attention to audiovisual synchrony is an infant marker of later-emerging autism diagnosis.Methods: We studied 10-month-old siblings of children with autism using an eye tracking task previously used in studies of preschoolers. The task assessed the effect of manipulations of audiovisual synchrony on viewing patterns while the infants were observing point light displays of biological motion. We analyzed the gaze data recorded in infancy according to diagnostic status at 3 years of age (DSM-5).Results: Ten-month-old infants who later received an autism diagnosis did not orient to audiovisual synchrony expressed within biological motion. In contrast, both infants at low-risk and high-risk siblings without autism at follow-up had a strong preference for this type of information. No group differences were observed in terms of orienting to upright biological motion.Conclusions: This study suggests that reduced orienting to audiovisual synchrony within biological motion is an early sign of autism. The findings support the view that poor multisensory processing could be an important antecedent marker of this neurodevelopmental condition.
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| 47. |
- Falck-Ytter, Terje, Professor, 1979-, et al.
(author)
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Social attention : Developmental foundations and relevance for autism spectrum disorder
- 2023
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In: Biological Psychiatry. - : Elsevier. - 0006-3223 .- 1873-2402. ; 94:1, s. 8-17
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- The use of the term Social Attention (SA) in the cognitive neuroscience and developmental psychopathology literature has increased exponentially in recent years, in part motivated by the aim to understand the early development of autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Unfortunately, theoretical discussions around the term have lagged behind its various uses. Here, we evaluate SA through a review of key candidate SA phenotypes emerging early in life, from newborn gaze cueing and preference for face-like configurations to later emerging skills such as joint attention. We argue that most of the considered SA phenotypes are unlikely to represent unique socio-attentional processes but have to be understood in the broader context of bottom-up and emerging top-down (domain-general) attention. Some types of SA behaviors (e.g., initiation of joint attention) are linked to the early development of ASD, but this may reflect differences in social motivation rather than attention per se. Several SA candidates are not linked to ASD early in life, including the ones that may represent uniquely socio-attentional processes (e.g., orienting to faces, predicting others’ manual action goals). Although SA may be a useful super-ordinate category under which one can organize certain research questions, the widespread use of the term without proper definition is problematic. Characterizing gaze patterns and visual attention in infants at elevated likelihood for ASD in social contexts may facilitate early detection, but conceptual clarity regarding the underlying processes at play are needed to sharpen research questions and identify potential targets for early intervention.
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| 48. |
- Falck-Ytter, Terje, et al.
(author)
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The Babytwins Study Sweden (BATSS): A Multi-Method Infant Twin Study of Genetic and Environmental Factors Influencing Infant Brain and Behavioral Development
- 2021
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In: Twin Research and Human Genetics. - : Cambridge University Press (CUP). - 1832-4274 .- 1839-2628. ; 24:4, s. 217-227
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Twin studies can help us understand the relative contributions of genes and environment to phenotypic trait variation, including attentional and brain activation measures. In terms of applying methodologies such as electroencephalography (EEG) and eye tracking, which are key methods in developmental neuroscience, infant twin studies are almost nonexistent. Here, we describe the Babytwins Study Sweden (BATSS), a multi-method longitudinal twin study of 177 MZ and 134 DZ twin pairs (i.e., 622 individual infants) covering the 5-36 month time period. The study includes EEG, eye tracking and genetics, together with more traditional measures based on in-person testing, direct observation and questionnaires. The results show that interest in participation in research among twin parents is high, despite the comprehensive protocol. DNA analysis from saliva samples was possible in virtually all participants, allowing for both zygosity confirmation and polygenic score analyses. Combining a longitudinal twin design with advanced technologies in developmental cognitive neuroscience and genomics, BATSS represents a new approach in infancy research, which we hope to have impact across multiple disciplines in the coming years.
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| 49. |
- Falck-Ytter, Terje, Professor, 1979-
(author)
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The breakdown of social looking
- 2024
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In: Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews. - : Elsevier. - 0149-7634 .- 1873-7528. ; 161
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Research review (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Individual differences in social looking are commonly believed to reflect one single heritable dimension tightly linked to autism. Yet, recent data suggest that in human infants, looking to eyes (rather than mouth) and preference for faces (versus non-social objects) reflect distinct genetic influences, and neither appear to have a clear-cut relation to autism.
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| 50. |
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