Autistic people exhibit atypical use of prior information when processing simple perceptual stimuli; yet, it remains unclear whether and how these difficulties in using priors extend to complex ...social stimuli. Here, we compared autistic people without accompanying intellectual disability and nonautistic people in their ability to acquire an “emotional prior” of a facial expression and update this prior to a different facial expression of the same identity. Participants performed a two‐interval same/different discrimination task between two facial expressions. To study the acquisition of the prior, we examined how discrimination was modified by the contraction of the perceived facial expressions toward the average of presented stimuli (i.e., regression to the mean). At first, facial expressions surrounded one average emotional prior (mostly sad or angry), and then the average switched (to mostly angry or sad, accordingly). Autistic people exhibited challenges in facial discrimination, and yet acquired the first prior, demonstrating typical regression‐to‐the‐mean effects. However, unlike nonautistic people, autistic people did not update their perception to the second prior, suggesting they are less flexible in updating an acquired prior of emotional expressions. Our findings shed light on the perception of emotional expressions, one of the most pressing challenges in autism.
Lay Summary
The ability to flexibly adapt to changing emotional context is critical for social interactions and is one of the most pressing challenges in social functioning of autistic people. For instance, a mother of an autistic child, who is angry at her son, even after the anger has passed, may hear her son asking, “Are you still angry?”, reflecting the importance of understanding, adapting, and conveying her emotional state and the level of uncertainty in the child's own ability to read out the change of her emotional state. Although the perception of facial expressions is difficult for autistic people, it is unclear how this difficulty may impact the ability to adapt to changing emotional context. Here, we examined this ability in autistic and nonautistic people, specifically testing how discrimination was modified by the emotional context formed by the presented facial expressions. First, participants were exposed to expressions surrounding one emotion (e.g., mostly angry expressions). Then, the facial expressions shifted to surround a different emotion (e.g., to mostly sad expressions). We show that although autistic people exhibit difficulties in discriminating between facial expressions, the perception of both groups was influenced to a similar degree by the exposure to the first emotional context. But when the emotional context shifted, autistic people demonstrated difficulty adjusting to the change. Our results suggest that autistic people are characterized by general inflexibility in adjusting to changes, which likely contributes to their difficulties in social interaction.
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FZAB, GIS, IJS, KILJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, SAZU, SBCE, SBMB, UL, UM, UPUK
Perceptual atypicalities are a widely acknowledged but poorly understood feature of autism. We demonstrate here a striking violation of one of the most adaptive psychophysical computations - Weber's ...law - in high-functioning individuals with autism. JNDs based on the best-fitting psychometric functions were measured for size visual judgments (Exp. 1), weight haptic discrimination (Exp. 2), and illusive perception of weight (brightness-weight illusion; Exp. 3). Results for the typically developed group confirmed Weber's law, demonstrating a linear increase in JNDs with intensity, resulting in constant fractions across intensities. The results for the ASD, in contrast, showed no scaling of JNDs with intensity; instead, fractions decreased linearly with intensity. In striking contrast to its consistency in typical perception, Weber's law does not hold for visual and haptic perception in autism. These robust modulations in psychophysical computations, demonstrated for different domains of perception, suggest a modality-independent, low-level mechanism driving altered perception in autism.
Atypical sensory perception and motor impairments are primary features of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) that indicate atypical development and predict social and non-social challenges. However, ...their link is poorly understood. Sensory perception is often integrated with motor processes when a sensory effect is temporally contiguous with the motor response. Such sensory-motor coupling further improves motor behavior. Previous studies indicate alterations in sensory perception of action-effect temporal contiguity in ASD, which bares the question of how it may impact motor performance. People diagnosed with ASD and typically developed (TD) participants performed a speeded reaction-time task previously established to capture the facilitating impact of action's perceptual effect on motor response selection. The sensitivity of this mechanism to delays in the effect was measured, manipulating the action-effect temporal contiguity in a within-subject design. An immediate action effect (compared to a No-effect condition) facilitated response selection in the TD group. This facilitation effect was evident in the ASD group but did not show the typical sensitivity to the effect delay. While in the TD group, RT was shorter in the short (225ms) compared to the long (675ms) action effect delay condition, this distinguished pattern was absent in the ASD group. The findings provide supporting evidence that atypical motor performance in ASD results, at least in part, from an altered sensory perception of action effect temporal contiguity. We discuss the results in light of the reduced perceptual specialization account in ASD and its potential for undermining adaptive sensorimotor processes.
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EMUNI, FIS, FZAB, GEOZS, GIS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, MFDPS, NLZOH, NUK, OBVAL, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, SBMB, SBNM, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK, VKSCE, ZAGLJ
Face recognition has been shown to be impaired in autism spectrum disorders (ASD). However, it is still debated whether these face processing deficits arise from perceptually based alterations. We ...tested individuals with ASD and matched typically developing (TD) individuals using a delayed estimation task in which a single target face was shown either upright or inverted. Participants selected a face that best resembled the target face out of a cyclic space of morphed faces. To enable the disentanglement of visual from mnemonic processing, reports were required either following a 1 and 6 second retention interval, or simultaneously while the target face was still visible. Individuals with ASD made significantly more errors than TD individuals in both the simultaneous and delayed intervals, indicating that face recognition deficits in autism are also perceptual rather than strictly memory based. Moreover, individuals with ASD exhibited weaker inversion effects than the TD individuals, on all retention intervals. This finding, that was mostly evident in precision errors, suggests that contrary to the more precise representations of upright faces in TD individuals, individuals with ASD exhibit similar levels of precision for inverted and upright faces, for both simultaneous and delayed conditions. These results suggest that weakened memory for faces reported in ASD may be secondary to an underlying perceptual deficit in face processing.
Lay Summary
Individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) are known to have difficulties recognizing faces on a day‐to‐day basis. This research delves into the potential reasons underlying this difficulty. Results suggest that the facial processing impairment within ASD may not be only a memory difficulty but also a perceptual difficulty. These findings add to the understanding of the core abilities within ASD and may have direct implications for the treatment of facial processing difficulties within this population.
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FZAB, GIS, IJS, KILJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, SAZU, SBCE, SBMB, UL, UM, UPUK
The perception of magnitude, crucial for a mental representation of the physical world, is often subject to significant biases. Many of these biases are similar across sensory modalities, implying a ...generalized perception of magnitude. At the same time, some physical magnitudes might have a dedicated modality-specific calibration mechanism to enhance perceptual sensitivity. We examined this question of generalized versus modality-specific processes testing between- and within-modalities' contextual effects on the perception of magnitude. In a constant stimuli procedure, a central standard was embedded in shorter and longer contextual standards. These contextual standards were sampled in either a relatively wider or narrower range of durations. Participants were asked to determine which of the two consecutive durations was longer. Better perceptual sensitivity was found for narrower contexts, with stronger effects in trials in which the standard was presented first. Interestingly, narrower context enhanced sensitivity for standards within the same modality but had no effect on standards of another modality. A unidirectional transfer of contextual effects was observed under certain conditions from auditory, the dominant modality in performing temporal judgments, to vision. These results suggest that the perceptual system appears to develop modality-specific calibration mechanisms, most likely, to enhance perceptual sensitivity and maintain sensory specialization.
Public Significance StatementThis study shows that both the visual and the auditory modalities use contextual information to calibrate sensitivity of duration perception; however, duration perception is only calibrated by modality-specific context, presumably to maintain sensory specialization.
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CEKLJ, FFLJ, NUK, ODKLJ, PEFLJ, UPUK
Although researchers have debated whether a core deficit of nonsymbolic representation of magnitude underlies developmental dyscalculia (DD), research has mostly focused on numerosity processing. We ...probed the possibility of a general magnitude deficit in individuals with DD and asked whether sensitivity to size varied in contexts of depth ordering and size constancy. We measured full psychometric functions in size-discrimination tasks in 12 participants with DD and 13 control participants. Results showed that although people with DD exhibited veridical perceived magnitude, their sensitivity to size was clearly impaired. In contrast, when objects were embedded in depth cues allowing size-constancy computations, participants with DD demonstrated typical sensitivity to size. These results demonstrate a deficit in the perceptual resolutions of magnitude in DD. At the same time, the finding of an intact size constancy suggests that when magnitude perception is facilitated by implicit mandatory computations of size constancy, this deficit is no longer evident.
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NUK, OILJ, SAZU, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
Emerging accounts of autism suggest that flexible and broadly tuned perceptual representations, presumably resulting from reduced specialization, may underlie atypical perception. Here, we examined ...the other-race effect (ORE) to study face processing specialization arising from specific experience with own-race faces. Face discrimination was tested for own- and other-race faces in typically developed individuals and in individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). For each race, faces were morphed to vary discrimination difficulty, and orientation was manipulated to examine inversion effects. The ASD group displayed overall lower sensitivity and reduced inversion effects in processing faces. Importantly, the processing advantage for own-race faces was substantially smaller in this group, resulting specifically from the reduced specialization for the own-race faces. Moreover, the typical larger inversion effect for Caucasian faces was not observed in the ASD group; sensitivity to orientation was smaller and equivalent for the two face races. These more broadly tuned representations in autism may account for the overall weaker representations of faces and suggest, more broadly, that a failure in perceptual specialization may underlie atypical perception in autism.
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CEKLJ, FFLJ, NUK, ODKLJ, PEFLJ, UPUK
We used a staircase procedure to test sensitivity to (1) global motion in random‐dot kinematograms moving at 4° and 18° s−1 and (2) biological motion. Thresholds were defined as (1) the minimum ...percentage of signal dots (i.e. the maximum percentage of noise dots) necessary for accurate discrimination of upward versus downward motion or (2) the maximum percentage of noise dots tolerated for accurate discrimination of biological from non‐biological motion. Subjects were adults and children aged 6–8, 9–11, and 12–14 years (n = 20 per group). Contrary to earlier research, results revealed a similar, long developmental trajectory for sensitivity to global motion at both slower and faster speeds and for biological motion. Thresholds for all three tasks improved monotonically between 6 and 14 years of age, at which point they were adult‐like. The results suggest that the extrastriate mechanisms that integrate local motion cues over time and space take many years to mature.
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BFBNIB, DOBA, FZAB, GIS, IJS, IZUM, KILJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBMB, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
An action-effect temporal contiguity holds essential information for motor control. Emerging accounts suggest that the temporally contiguous action effect is rewarding in and of itself, further ...promoting the development of motor representations and reinforcing the selection of the relevant motor program. The current study follows these theoretical and empirical indications to directly investigate the promoting impact of action effect temporal contiguity on motor performance. In two experiments, participants rapidly moved toward a target location on a computer monitor and clicked on the target with their mouse key as quickly and accurately as possible. Their click response triggered a perceptual effect (a brief flash) on the target. To examine the impact of action-effect delay and its temporal contiguity context, we manipulated action-effect delay in two temporal contiguity contexts—long versus short lag conditions. The findings demonstrate that the temporally contiguous perceptual effect enhances motor performance as indicated by end-point precision and movement speed. In addition, a substantial impact of the temporal contiguity context was observed. Namely, we found enhanced motor performance after an ambiguous (300 ms) action-effect delay sampled from short compared to long lag distributions (Experiment
1
). This pattern was inconclusive for an immediate action effect (Experiment
2
). We discuss the findings in the context of reinforcement from action effect and movement control.
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EMUNI, FIS, FZAB, GEOZS, GIS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, MFDPS, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, SBMB, SBNM, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK, VKSCE, ZAGLJ
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