Differential profiles of response inhibition deficit between male children with autism spectrum disorders and schizophrenia

Abstract

Autism spectrum disorders (ASD) and schizophrenia (SZ) are both associated with response inhibition impairment. However, the relative pattern of deficits in these two disorders remains unclear. Twenty‐three male children with ASD, 23 male children with SZ, and 32 typically developing male controls were recruited to complete a set of tasks measuring response inhibition in the visual, auditory, and verbal domains. We found that visual, auditory, and verbal response inhibitions were impaired in both children with ASD and children with SZ. Compared with typically developing controls, children with ASD made more commission errors whereas children with SZ responded much slower in the visual response inhibition task. Both clinical groups showed comparable impairment in verbal response inhibition, but children with SZ were more impaired in auditory response inhibition than children with ASD. These different patterns of response inhibition deficit between male children with ASD and SZ may help to differentiate between these two disorders and may be potential targets for intervention. Autism Res 2020, 13: 591–602. © 2019 International Society for Autism Research, Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Lay Summary In this study, we found that male children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) made more commission errors whereas male children with schizophrenia (SZ) responded much slower in the visual response inhibition task. Both clinical groups exhibited comparable impairments in verbal response inhibition, but male children with SZ were more impaired in auditory response inhibition than male children with ASD. Our findings provide potential targets for intervention.

Autism spectrum disorder and schizophrenia: An updated conceptual review

“…Within ASD, impaired response inhibition, a particular form of EF impairment, appeared in one small study to be associated with self‐reported “schizotypal” disorganized thoughts (Barneveld et al, 2013). This finding is interesting in light of a report of greater impairment in auditory response inhibition in SCZ compared to ASD in a population of males aged 11–16 but similar impairment in visual response inhibition across both disorders (Shi et al, 2020). Response inhibition may be a potential avenue for future exploration with regard to SCZ vulnerability within ASD.…”

Differences in daily life executive functioning between people with autism and people with schizophrenia

“…For instance, limitations and difficulties in inhibiting prepotent responses and suppressing distractors have been confirmed (for a review see Hlavatá et al, 2018;Zhang et al, 2020). Also, automatic inhibition of visual, auditory and verbal responses was found to be impaired in both ASD and SSD (Shi et al, 2020).…”

Categorical and Dimensional Approaches to Examining the Joint Effect of Autism and Schizotypal Personality Disorder on Sustained Attention

“…( 21 ) found no differences between healthy controls and schizophrenic patients, Shi et al. ( 26 ) found no differences between ASD and SSD children, and Johnson et al. ( 22 ) found no differences between ASD and typically developing children.…”

“…While the lack of differences may be due to the SART being relatively an easy task to perform, these results partially overlap with findings from previous research, although caution is warranted since we are comparing our results to findings from populations with different diagnoses (schizophrenia) and at different developmental stages (children, elderly). With respect to commission errors on the fixed SART, O'Grada et al (19), Chan et al (20), and Ho et al (21) found no differences between healthy controls and schizophrenic patients, Shi et al (26) found no differences between ASD and SSD children, and Johnson et al (22) found no differences between ASD and typically developing children. In contrast, however, Johnson et al (22) reported higher number of commission errors in ASD relative to typically children while performing the random SART, and Geurts et al (23) reported similar results in elderly with ASD while performing the fixed SART.…”

“…Notably, the early psychosis group was significantly more impaired than the ASD group on sustained attention. To our knowledge, only one study ( 26 )—albeit in male children—compared response inhibition in ASD and SSD using the fixed version of the SART. They found that both the ASD and SSD groups had significantly lower correct responses than the typically developing group, and that the SSD group had slower reaction time and lower efficiency than the ASD group.…”