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An eye-tracking study for measuring the attentional characteristics towards emotional scenes in children with autism spectrum condition

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 August 2021

M. Lizarán ,
R. Sahuquillo-Leal ,
P. Navalón ,
A. Moreno-Giménez ,
B. Almansa ,
M. Vento  and
A. García-Blanco
M. Lizarán*
Affiliation:
Neonatal Research Group, The Medical Research Institute Hospital La Fe (IIS La Fe), Valencia, Spain
R. Sahuquillo-Leal
Affiliation:
Neonatal Research Group, The Medical Research Institute Hospital La Fe (IIS La Fe), Valencia, Spain
P. Navalón
Affiliation:
Neonatal Research Group, The Medical Research Institute Hospital La Fe (IIS La Fe), Valencia, Spain
A. Moreno-Giménez
Affiliation:
Neonatal Research Group, The Medical Research Institute Hospital La Fe (IIS La Fe), Valencia, Spain
B. Almansa
Affiliation:
Neonatal Research Group, The Medical Research Institute Hospital La Fe (IIS La Fe), Valencia, Spain
M. Vento
Affiliation:
Neonatal Research Group, The Medical Research Institute Hospital La Fe (IIS La Fe), Valencia, Spain
A. García-Blanco
Affiliation:
Neonatal Research Group, The Medical Research Institute Hospital La Fe (IIS La Fe), Valencia, Spain
*
*Corresponding author.

Abstract

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Introduction

The difficulties in social interaction present in individuals with autism spectrum conditions may are related with the abnormal attentional processing of emotional information. Specifically, it has been hypothesized that the hypersensibility to threat shown by individuals with autism may explain an avoidance behaviour. However, this hypothesis is not supported by research and the underlying psychological mechanisms of social interaction in autism still unclear.

Objectives

The aim of the present study was to examine attentional processing biases by administering a computer-based attentional task in a sample of 27 children with autism spectrum conditions and 25 typically developed participants (age 11-15 years).

Methods

The initial orienting of attention, the attention al engagement, and the attentional maintenance to different emotional scenes in competition (i.e. happy, neutral, threatening and sad) were measured by recording the eye movements during a 20 seconds free-viewing task.

Results

The main findings were: i) children with autism spectrum conditions showed an initial orientating bias towards threatening stimuli; and ii) while typically developed children revealed an attentional engagement and attentional maintenance bias towards threatening stimuli, children with autism spectrum conditions did not.

Conclusions

The findings of the present study are consistent with the affective information processing theories and shed light on the underlying mechanisms of social disturbances in autism spectrum conditions.

Keywords

autism spectrum conditionemotionsEye movementschildhood
Type
Abstract
Information
European Psychiatry , Volume 64 , Special Issue S1: Abstracts of the 29th European Congress of Psychiatry , April 2021 , pp. S226 - S227
Creative Commons
Creative Common License - CCCreative Common License - BY
This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the European Psychiatric Association
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