Difficulties perceiving speech in (non-)social noise in children and adolescents with autism spectrum disorder

Abstract

Difficulties in speech perception in noise are common in individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and may be associated with an attentional bias toward non-social stimuli. Although our previous study failed to find an interactive effect of (non-)social noise on the relationship between autistic traits and speech-in-noise perception difficulties, this effect could be observed in children with ASD who have greater attentional bias than individuals with high autistic traits in the general population. In this context, the present study tested two hypotheses: (1) children with ASD show greater difficulty perceiving speech in noise than children without ASD, and (2) they experience greater difficulty perceiving speech in non-vocal noise than in vocal noise. Participants were asked to detect words embedded in vocal and non-vocal background noise. Children with ASD had greater difficulties in speech perception in noise than children without ASD, supporting the first hypothesis. This group difference was not explained by performance in speech perception in silence or hypersensitivity to noise. However, the second hypothesis was not supported, which is consistent with the results of our previous study. These results suggest that autistic traits other than attentional bias toward non-vocal sounds explain the difficulties in speech perception in noise.