Abstract
Disturbance of primary prospective motor control has been proposed to contribute to faults in higher mind functions of individuals with autism spectrum disorder, but little research has been conducted to characterize prospective control strategies in autism. In the current study, we applied pattern-classification analyses to kinematic features to verify whether children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and typically developing (TD) children altered their initial grasp in anticipation of self- and other-actions. Results indicate that children with autism adjusted their behavior to accommodate onward actions. The way they did so, however, varied idiosyncratically from one individual to another, which suggests that previous characterizations of general lack of prospective control strategies may be overly simplistic. These findings link abnormalities in anticipatory control with increased variability and offer insights into the difficulties that individuals with ASD may experience in social interaction.
Highlights
The simple act of picking up a water glass is the product of multilayered cognitive plans and sophisticated neural computations[1,2]
We introduce a novel approach for parsing this heterogeneity through machine learning modeling of the kinematics of children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and typically developing (TD) children performing a sequential object manipulation task
Using multivariate cross-classification[14,15], we investigated the correspondence between prospective control strategies across ASD and TD groups
Summary
The simple act of picking up a water glass is the product of multilayered cognitive plans and sophisticated neural computations[1,2]. At the heart of these computations is prediction: motor performance anticipates futures states This goes beyond anticipating the properties of the object being reached for[3,4]. They alter their grasp based on what they expect their partner will do with the object[6] Failure to develop this primary form of prospective motor control has been proposed to contribute to faults in higher mind functions of individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD)[7,8]. We quantified individual pattern distortions within each group and correlation with ASD symptoms This multilevel pattern-classification approach was applied to test prospective control to accommodate both one’s own and another person’s action plans. Observations of grasping suggest that while 3-years-old TD children are already able to plan self-actions in advance, development of prospective of other-actions is protracted during www.nature.com/scientificreports/
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
