No Differences in Auditory Steady-State Responses in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder and Typically Developing Children.
Seppo P Ahlfors, Steven Graham, Hari Bharadwaj and 9 others
PMID 36932270WHAT IT FOUND
Brain scans showed no difference in auditory processing between children with autism and typically developing children.
The specific neural marker tested here does not distinguish the groups, so it is not a useful diagnostic tool for clinicians working with this age range.
Key findings
01There were no significant group differences in auditory steady-state responses at either stimulation frequency.
02The study did not support the hypothesis that local functional connectivity abnormalities in autism generalize from the somatosensory to the auditory domain.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for SLPs
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What it does not show
The study did not include adolescents or young adults, so it cannot rule out differences in older age groups where ASSR abnormalities have been reported. The sample size was relatively small (22 ASD, 31 TD), which may limit the ability to detect subtle differences. The groups differed significantly on verbal IQ, which may have influenced the neural measures, although the authors analyzed this and found no correlation between IQ and the primary ASSR measures.
Declared interests
The text does not explicitly state funding sources or conflicts of interest in the provided sentences, but notes IRB approval and informed consent.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that children with autism have normal auditory processing. This study only shows that this specific brain scan measure (ASSR) does not detect differences in this age group; it does not prove that auditory processing is unaffected.