Discrimination sensitivity of visual shapes sharpens in autistic adults but only after explicit category learning.
Jaana Van Overwalle, Birte Geusens, Stephanie Van der Donck and 2 others
PMID 38831439WHAT IT FOUND
Autistic adults did not automatically perceive visual categories like non-autistic adults did.
They only showed this perceptual sharpening after explicit training. This suggests they need direct feedback to categorize unfamiliar visual shapes, rather than picking up patterns implicitly.
Key findings
01Non-autistic participants showed categorical perception (better discrimination across category boundaries) before any training, while autistic participants did not.
02After explicit categorization training, autistic participants' behavioral and neural discrimination sensitivity at the category boundary improved to match the pattern seen in non-autistic adults.
03Autistic participants were less accurate and showed more variability during the initial stage of category learning compared to non-autistic participants.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they found
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What it does not show
The study used artificial, unfamiliar shapes, so it is unclear if these results apply to real-world social or environmental cues. The sample size is moderate (38 per group), and the effect sizes for some key interactions were small. Data collection occurred during the COVID-19 pandemic, which may have introduced environmental variability. Fourteen of the autistic participants had comorbid conditions like ADHD or anxiety, though excluding them did not change the main conclusions.
Declared interests
The authors declared no conflicts of interest. Funding was provided by Fonds Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek, Methusalem (Belgium), Excellence of Science (EOS, Belgium), and KU Leuven.
The easy way to misread this
Do not interpret the lack of implicit categorical perception in autistic adults as a general deficit in learning or intelligence. The study shows they successfully acquired the perceptual skill after explicit training, indicating a difference in learning style (reliance on explicit feedback vs. implicit pattern detection) rather than an inability to learn.