Atypical and variable attention patterns reveal reduced contextual priors in children with autism spectrum disorder

doi:10.1002/aur.3194

PSYCH OpenIR

	Atypical and variable attention patterns reveal reduced contextual priors in children with autism spectrum disorder
	Hou, Wenwen 1,2; Cheng, Rong 1,2,3; Zhao, Zhong 3; Liao, Haotian 3; Li, Jing 1,2
通讯作者	Li, Jing(lij@psych.ac.cn)
摘要	Accumulating evidence suggests that individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) show impairments in using contextual priors to predict others' actions and make intention inference. Yet less is known about whether and how children with ASD acquire contextual priors during action observation and how contextual priors relate to their action prediction and intention inference. To form proper contextual priors, individuals need to observe the social scenes in a reliable manner and focus on socially relevant information. By employing a data-driven scan path method and areas of interest (AOI)-based analysis, the current study investigated how contextual priors would relate to action prediction and intention understanding in 4-to-9-year-old children with ASD (N = 56) and typically developing (TD) children (N = 50) during free viewing of dynamic social scenes with different intentions. Results showed that children with ASD exhibited higher intra-subject variability when scanning social scenes and reduced attention to socially relevant areas. Moreover, children with high-level action prediction and intention understanding showed lower intra-subject variability and increased attention to socially relevant areas. These findings suggest that altered fixation patterns might restrain children with ASD from acquiring proper contextual priors, which has cascading downstream effects on their action prediction and intention understanding. Skilled social interactions require individuals to infer others' intentions and predict others' actions based on prior experiences, which is impaired in children with ASD. The present study investigated whether and how children with ASD acquire prior knowledge and how their prior knowledge would influence action prediction and intention understanding during viewing dynamic social scenes. We found that children with ASD viewed social scenes in an unpredictable way and showed decreased attention to socially relevant areas as compared with typically developing children. Moreover, children with high-level action prediction and intention understanding observed the social scenes in a more predictable way and exhibited increased attention to socially relevant areas. These findings suggest that children with ASD may acquire unreliable prior knowledge, which has adverse effects on their action prediction and intention understanding.
关键词	action prediction attention allocation autism spectrum disorder (ASD) contextual priors intention understanding intra-subject variability
	2024-07-08
语种	英语
DOI	10.1002/aur.3194
发表期刊	AUTISM RESEARCH
ISSN	1939-3792
页码	14
收录类别	SCI
资助项目	National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC)[31971009] ; Youth Innovation Promotion Association of the Chinese Academy of Sciences
出版者	WILEY
WOS关键词	ADULTS
WOS研究方向	Behavioral Sciences ; Psychology
WOS类目	Behavioral Sciences ; Psychology, Developmental
WOS记录号	WOS:001263956100001
资助机构	National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC) ; Youth Innovation Promotion Association of the Chinese Academy of Sciences
引用统计
文献类型	期刊论文
条目标识符	https://ir.psych.ac.cn/handle/311026/49270
通讯作者	Li, Jing
作者单位	1.Chinese Acad Sci, Inst Psychol, CAS Key Lab Behav Sci, Beijing, Peoples R China 2.Univ Chinese Acad Sci, Dept Psychol, Beijing, Peoples R China 3.Shenzhen Univ, Coll Mechatron & Control Engn, Shenzhen, Peoples R China
推荐引用方式 GB/T 7714	Hou, Wenwen,Cheng, Rong,Zhao, Zhong,et al. Atypical and variable attention patterns reveal reduced contextual priors in children with autism spectrum disorder[J]. AUTISM RESEARCH,2024:14.
APA	Hou, Wenwen,Cheng, Rong,Zhao, Zhong,Liao, Haotian,&Li, Jing.(2024).Atypical and variable attention patterns reveal reduced contextual priors in children with autism spectrum disorder.AUTISM RESEARCH,14.
MLA	Hou, Wenwen,et al."Atypical and variable attention patterns reveal reduced contextual priors in children with autism spectrum disorder".AUTISM RESEARCH (2024):14.