Color Afterimages in Autistic Adults

John Maule,Kirstie Stanworth,Anna Franklin,Elizabeth Pellicano

doi:10.1007/s10803-016-2786-5

John Maule, Kirstie Stanworth + Show 2 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-016-2786-5

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Abstract

It has been suggested that attenuated adaptation to visual stimuli in autism is the result of atypical perceptual priors (e.g., Pellicano and Burr in Trends Cogn Sci 16(10):504–510, 2012. doi:10.1016/j.tics.2012.08.009). This study investigated adaptation to color in autistic adults, measuring both strength of afterimage and the influence of top-down knowledge. We found no difference in color afterimage strength between autistic and typical adults. Effects of top-down knowledge on afterimage intensity shown by Lupyan (Acta Psychol 161:117–130, 2015. doi:10.1016/j.actpsy.2015.08.006) were not replicated for either group. This study finds intact color adaptation in autistic adults. This is in contrast to findings of attenuated adaptation to faces and numerosity in autistic children. Future research should investigate the possibility of developmental differences in adaptation and further examine top-down effects on adaptation.

Highlights

Autism is characterized by difficulties in social communication and behavioral traits including rigid patterns of behavior, preference for sameness, and intense and restricted interests (American Psychiatric Association 2013)
This study investigated adaptation to color in autistic adults, measuring both strength of afterimage and the influence of top-down knowledge
Higher chroma difference scores indicate that more intensely-colored images were selected to null the afterimage, indicating that the afterimage was stronger in that trial or condition

Summary

Introduction

Autism is characterized by difficulties in social communication and behavioral traits including rigid patterns of behavior, preference for sameness, and intense and restricted interests (American Psychiatric Association 2013) Sensory symptoms, including both hyper-reactivity and hypo-reactivity to external stimuli, atypicalities in sensory processing and unusual sensory interests are included in the most recent revision of the diagnostic criteria for autism (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition (DSM-5) (American Psychiatric Association 2013). This inclusion implies that they are part of the core of autism, with such atypical sensory experiences potentially being related to other key features of the condition (Pellicano 2013). Others have proposed accounts of atypical (rather than reduced) priors in autism (e.g., Hellendoorn et al 2015), and predictive coding accounts of autistic perception (Friston et al 2013; Lawson et al 2014; Sinha et al 2014; Van de Cruys et al 2013)

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