Abstract
Individuals with Down syndrome (DS) are widely believed to possess considerable socialization strengths. However, the findings on social cognition capabilities are controversial. In the present study, we investigated whether individuals with DS exhibit shortage in face tuning, one of the indispensable components of social cognition. For this purpose, we implemented a recently developed Face-n-Food paradigm with food-plate images composed of food ingredients such as fruits and vegetables. The key benefit of such face-like non-face images is that single elements do not facilitate face processing. In a spontaneous recognition task, 25 children with DS aged 9 to 18 years were presented with a set of Face-n-Food images bordering on the Giuseppe Arcimboldo style. The set of images was administered in a predetermined order from the least to most resembling a face. In DS individuals, thresholds for recognition of the Face-n-Food images as a face were drastically higher as compared not only with typically developing controls, but also with individuals with autistic spectrum disorders and Williams-Beuren syndrome. This outcome represents a significant step toward better conceptualization of the visual social world in DS and neurodevelopmental disorders in general.
Highlights
Down syndrome (DS) is a set of cognitive and physical conditions that result from having an extra copy of chromosome 21
When an image had been seen as a face, DS individuals often exhibited emotional reaction such as smiling and astonishment
We compared thresholds for face tuning for DS individuals and typically developing (TD) controls
Summary
Down syndrome (DS) is a set of cognitive and physical conditions that result from having an extra copy of chromosome 21. This is one of the most common sporadic genetic disorders with prevalence generally estimated around 1 per 1,000 live births: 1.447 in the United States in 2004– 2006 (Parker et al, 2010) or more recently in the Netherlands, about 1.11 (de Graaf et al, 2017b). Children with DS (aged 10 to 18 years) exhibit more difficulties in judging, identifying and reasoning about transgression of social rules (Barisnikov and Lejeune, 2018). Adapted daily life social participation of DS individuals is of tremendous value for their quality of life, and investigation of visual social cognition in this population is of high social and clinical relevance
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