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

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 m...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of Autism & Developmental Disorders Vol. 46; no. 5; pp. 1762 - 1773
Main Authors: Hagmann, Carl, Wyble, Bradley, Shea, Nicole, LeBlanc, Megan, Kates, Wendy, Russo, Natalie
Format: research tables/charts Journal Article
Published: Springer Nature May2016
Online Access:View this record in EBSCOhost
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Summary: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 distractors. 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.