Visual orienting in children with autism: Hyper-responsiveness to human eyes presented after a brief alerting audio-signal, but hyporesponsiveness to eyes presented without sound.
Johan Lundin Kleberg, Emilia Thorup, Terje Falck-Ytter
PMID 27454075WHAT IT FOUND
Children with autism looked more slowly at eyes when images appeared silently, but more quickly when a brief sound preceded them.
Typical children showed the opposite pattern. This is a lab eye-tracking finding, not evidence that sound improves communication.
Key findings
01The difference between groups depended on whether a sound preceded the eyes.
02Without sound, children with autism looked at the eyes more slowly than typically developing children.
03With sound, children with autism looked at the eyes faster than typically developing children.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for SLPs
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What it does not show
The analysis included only 15 children with autism and 16 typically developing children, and one child with autism was removed as an outlier. A technical error meant one nonsocial sound trial was missing for all participants, so only three trials in each condition were analysed. The study measured fixation speed in a computer task, not eye contact in daily life, communication, or response to treatment. Children were matched on nonverbal IQ, so the findings may not apply to children with very different ability levels. The paper tested visual orienting, not a therapy, so it cannot show that sound helps a child.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that brief sounds improve eye contact or communication in autism. The study measured speed of looking at eyes in a lab task and did not test a therapy or a communication outcome.