Early Visual Foraging in Relationship to Familial Risk for Autism and Hyperactivity/Inattention

Gliga, Teodora; Smith, Tim J.; Likely, Noreen; Charman, Tony; Johnson, Mark H.

doi:10.1177/1087054715616490

Cited by 22 publications

(25 citation statements)

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“…A number of prospective studies have reported data that make it more challenging to determine if regression has occurred. These include studies in which only standardized scores [Estes et al, ; Landa, Gross, Stuart, & Bauman, ; Levin, Varcin, O'Leary, Tager‐Flusberg, & Nelson, Lord, Luyster, Guthrie, & Pickles, ] or group data are reported [Barbaro & Dissanayake, ;Caravella & Roberts, ; Chenausky, Nelson, & Tager‐Flusberg, ; Filliter et al, ; Gliga, Smith, Likely, Charman, & Johnson, ; Ibañez, Grantz, & Messinger, ; Iverson et al, ], where loss and plateau are not differentiated [Brian et al, ], or where longitudinal analysis was not carried out [Bedford, et al, ; Gangi et al, ]. Although these studies show progressive divergence from typical development, they cannot differentiate developmental arrest or slowing from regression, and group data may have obscured variability within groups [Elsabbagh & Johnson, ].…”

Section: Evidence For Regression and Prevalence Ratesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Regression in autism spectrum disorder: Reconciling findings from retrospective and prospective research

et al. 2018

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The way in which the behavioral manifestations of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) emerge in infancy is variable. Regression-loss of previously acquired skills-occurs in a subset of children. However, the etiology and significance of regression remains unclear. Until recently, investigation of regression relied on retrospective report by parents or examination of home videos from early in life. However, home videos and retrospective report of the nature and timing of regression, and association with factors such as illness or immunization, is potentially subject to bias. The advent of prospective studies of infant siblings at familial high-risk of ASD has the potential to document regression as it occurs. Recent research has suggested that subtle loss of skills occurs in a larger proportion of children with ASD than previously assumed; however, there are few reports of clear-cut regressions, such as that involving dramatic loss of language and other established skills, in the prospective literature. This could be because of the following: clear-cut regression occurs less commonly than parent report suggests, study design limits the potential to detect regression, or there are differences between multiplex and simplex families in the rate of de novo genetic mutations and therefore regression risk. This review will bring together literature from retrospective and prospective research and attempt to reconcile diverging findings, with a specific focus on methodological issues. Changing conceptualizations of regression will be discussed, as well as etiological factors that may be associated with regression. The main challenges that need to be addressed to measure regression in prospective studies will be set out.Lay Summary: Regression-a loss of previously established skills-occurs in a subset of children with ASD. Parental recall is not always accurate but studying younger siblings of children with ASD, 10-20% of whom will develop ASD, should make it possible to measure regression as it occurs. Clear-cut regression, like loss of language, has not often been reported in infant sibling studies, but recent research suggests that gradual loss of social engagement might be more common. This review looks at the evidence for regression from infant sibling studies and asks how study design affects the likelihood of capturing regression.

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Section: Evidence For Regression and Prevalence Ratesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Regression in autism spectrum disorder: Reconciling findings from retrospective and prospective research

et al. 2018

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“…However, revisitations in visual scanning may serve as an early marker of atypical attention development in infants at risk of autism. Gliga, Smith, Gilhooly, Charman, and Johnson (2015) calculated the probability of revisitations by coding up to 10 visits (i.e., the sum of all consecutive fixations within an AOI). However, information about local temporal gaze patterns (i.e., LAM) gets lost by collapsing consecutive fixations into one visit.…”

Section: Average Fixation Duration Versus Rqa Parametersmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…RQA could prove useful for studying visual scanning in atypical development. Children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) demonstrate high revisitation rates when exploring natural visual scenes (Gliga et al, 2015). Additionally, infant siblings of children with ASD exhibit socio-communicative problems, which could be linked to difficulties with attention disengagement from socially relevant stimuli (Elsabbagh et al, 2013).…”

Section: Future Directionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Additionally, infant siblings of children with ASD exhibit socio-communicative problems, which could be linked to difficulties with attention disengagement from socially relevant stimuli (Elsabbagh et al, 2013). Moreover, disorders such as ADHD are associated with novelty seeking and higher exploration in visual scenes (Gliga et al, 2015). As we have shown in this paper, the RQA measures are sensitive to scene type and content and thus, may prove useful in studying how preference for local over global features or low-level attention difficulties contribute to atypical scanning patterns of complex scenes with social stimuli (see Cheung, Bedford, Johnson, Charman, & Gliga, 2018).…”

Section: Future Directionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Beyond fixation durations: Recurrence quantification analysis reveals spatiotemporal dynamics of infant visual scanning

et al. 2018

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Standard looking-duration measures in eye-tracking data provide only general quantitative indices, while details of the spatiotemporal structuring of fixation sequences are lost. To overcome this, various tools have been developed to measure the dynamics of fixations. However, these analyses are only useful when stimuli have high perceptual similarity and they require the previous definition of areas of interest (AOIs). Although these methods have been widely applied in adult studies, relatively little is known about the temporal structuring of infant gaze-foraging behaviors such as variability of scanning over time or individual scanning patterns. Thus, to shed more light on the spatiotemporal characteristics of infant fixation sequences we apply for the first time a new methodology for nonlinear time-series analysis-the recurrence quantification analysis (RQA). We present how the dynamics of infant scanning varies depending on the scene content during a ''pop-out'' search task. Moreover, we show how the normalization of RQA measures with average fixation durations provides a more detailed account of the dynamics of fixation sequences. Finally, we link the RQA measures of temporal dynamics of scanning with the spatial information about the stimuli using heat maps of recurrences without the need for defining a priori AOIs and present how infants' foraging strategies are driven by the image content. We conclude from our findings that the RQA methodology has potential applications in the analysis of the temporal dynamics of infant visual foraging offering advantages over existing methods.

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“…Indeed, from infancy onwards, a balance between exploitation (of the known) and exploration (of the unknown) is essential for optimal adaptation to the environment so that one is alert to pertinent new information but at the same time can focus on a task at hand (16). If there is a bias towards exploitation or exploration, this could impact optimal foraging and, consequently, learning and adaptive functioning (18).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

What is the effect of stimulus complexity on attention to repeating and changing information in Autism?

Arora

Bellato

Gliga

et al. 2020

Preprint

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Background Previous research has suggested that atypical attention in autism might be driven by a preference for sameness over novelty. There is also evidence of slower habituation to a repeating stimulus in autism. It is not known whether slower habituation is driven by atypically slower processing of repeating information or whether it is a manifestation of an attentional bias away from novelty towards sameness. Methods We adapted an existing eye-tracking task and measured eye movements to two streams of stimuli presented simultaneously, one each in the left and right sides of the screen. One stimulus repeated while the second stimulus changed across trials. We manipulated the complexity of the stimuli between three conditions: a simple shapes condition, a social (smiling faces) condition and a complex non-social condition (clocks with moving parts). Using the slope of change in the longest look duration to each stimulus over trials, we measured whether autistic features were associated with slower habituation (to the repeating stimulus) and/or reduced attention to novelty (changing stimulus) over trials, and whether these effects were more pronounced in conditions with higher stimulus complexity (social and non-social complex conditions) compared with low complexity (simple shapes condition). We presented the task to two independent samples of children: 7-15 years old children and adolescents (n=103) diagnosed with Autism, ADHD or co-occurring Autism and ADHD and neurotypical children (Study 1); neurotypical children (n=64) with varying levels of subclinical traits of Autism (Study 2). Results Across the two studies, autistic features were associated with positive slopes of change in look durations (longer looks over time) to the repeating stimulus and negative slopes (shorter looks over time) to the changing stimulus, only in conditions with higher stimulus complexity. Negative slopes to the changing stimulus in conditions of higher stimulus complexity was associated with higher severity of social interaction difficulties (in Study 1). Conclusions Reduced attention to novelty in autism might partly be driven by difficulties in processing more complex information, which might contribute to the development of social interaction difficulties in autism. Replication in larger samples and longitudinal research using younger age groups are recommended.

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Early Visual Foraging in Relationship to Familial Risk for Autism and Hyperactivity/Inattention

Cited by 22 publications

References 47 publications

Regression in autism spectrum disorder: Reconciling findings from retrospective and prospective research

Regression in autism spectrum disorder: Reconciling findings from retrospective and prospective research

Beyond fixation durations: Recurrence quantification analysis reveals spatiotemporal dynamics of infant visual scanning

What is the effect of stimulus complexity on attention to repeating and changing information in Autism?

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