Atypical Pupillary Light Reflex and Heart Rate Variability in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder

Abstract

We investigated pupillary light reflex (PLR) in 152 children with ASD, 116 typically developing (TD) children, and 36 children with non-ASD neurodevelopmental disorders (NDDs). Heart rate variability (HRV) was measured simultaneously to study potential impairments in the autonomic nervous system (ANS) associated with ASD. The results showed that the ASD group had significantly longer PLR latency, reduced relative constriction amplitude, and shorter constriction/redilation time than those of the TD group. Similar atypical PLR parameters were observed in the NDD group. A significant age effect on PLR latency was observed in children younger than 9 years in the TD group, but not in the ASD and NDD groups. Atypical HRV parameters were observed in the ASD and NDD groups. A significant negative correlation existed between the PLR constriction amplitude and average heart rate in children with an ASD, but not in children with typical development.

Association between pupillary light reflex and sensory behaviors in children with autism spectrum disorders

“…Children with ASD showed multiple atypical PLR parameters including longer latency, less constriction amplitude, and shorter constriction/redilation times. We also found a significant age effect in PLR latency in children with typical development that was not observed in children with ASD (Daluwatte et al, 2013). …”

“…Multiple atypical neurological and behavioral measures have been found in ASD. We recently discovered that children with ASD showed significantly different pupillary light reflex (PLR) than typically developing children (Fan, Miles, Takahashi, & Yao, 2009; Daluwatte et al, 2013). PLR measures the dynamic changes in pupil size induced by optical luminance changes.…”

rPLR: an imaging system for measuring pupillary light reflex at a distance

“…7(b) and 7(c) show the extracted relative constriction and latency at stimulation intensities from 4.5 × 10 −5 to 2.8 × 10 −3 W/m 2 . PLR constriction and latency are often used in study neurological disorders [6,11]. The relative constriction is defined as the change of pupil size in relation to the baseline pupil size.…”

“…Being able to test PLR in young children is important for certain applications such as for early screening of neurodevelopmental disorders [2,6]. Unfortunately, children at young ages often cannot cooperatively restrict their movement during the test.…”

Google Trends Analyses and Case Report: A Persistently Dilated Pupil in Psychedelics’ User

“…Changes in the sympathetic or parasympathetic tone (neuronal activity) are brought up by changes via; reflex mechanism (as in pupillary light reflex), emotional changes affecting the limbic system and the diencephalon specifically the hypothalamus, and the modulation of the neuronal activity in the midbrain specifically pretectal region and the Edinger-Westphal nucleus (accessory oculomotor nucleus). The Edinger-Westphal nucleus houses the presynaptic (preganglionic) parasympathetic motor neurones of the oculomotor nerve which innervate the sphincter pupillae iridial muscles (Daluwatte et al, 2013;Vaz et al, 2014). Hence, this pathway, via the pretectal-accessory oculomotor nucleus, is a critical component of the pupillary light reflex, the afferent and efferent nerves of this pathway are the optic nerve and the oculomotor nerve respectively; the reflex is considered to be a four-neuronal reflex pathway (Kaufman et al, 2011).…”