Abstract
Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder that is characterized by a constellation of symptoms, including impairments in social communication, restricted interests, and repetitive behaviors. Although sensory issues have long been reported in clinical descriptions of ASD, only the most recent edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-V) has included differences in sensory processing as part of the diagnostic profile for ASD. Indeed, sensory processing differences are among the most prevalent findings in ASD, and these differences are increasingly recognized as a core component of ASD. Furthermore, characterizing ASD phenotypes on the basis of sensory processing differences has been suggested as a constructive means of creating phenotypic subgroups of ASD, which may be useful to better tailor individualized treatment strategies. Although sensory processing differences are frequently approached from the perspective of deficits in the context of ASD, there are a number of instances in which individuals with ASD outperform their neurotypical counterparts on tests of sensory function. Here, the current state of knowledge regarding sensory processing in ASD is reviewed, with a particular emphasis on auditory and multisensory (i.e., audiovisual) performance. In addition to characterizing the nature of these differences in sensory performance, the chapter focuses on the neurological correlates of these sensory processing differences and how differences in sensory function relate to the other core clinical features of ASD, with an emphasis on speech and language.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Abdeltawwab, M. M., & Baz, H. (2015). Automatic pre-attentive auditory responses: MMN to tone burst frequency changes in autistic school-age children. The Journal of International Advanced Otology, 11(1), 36–41.
Abrams, D. A., Lynch, C. J., Cheng, K. M., Phillips, J., Supekar, K., Ryali, S., Uddin, L. Q., & Menon, V. (2013). Underconnectivity between voice-selective cortex and reward circuitry in children with autism. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 110(29), 12060–12065.
Annaz, D., Campbell, R., Coleman, M., Milne, E., & Swettenham, J. (2012). Young children with autism spectrum disorder do not preferentially attend to biological motion. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 42(3), 401–408.
Ashburner, J., Ziviani, J., & Rodger, S. (2008). Sensory processing and classroom emotional, behavioral, and educational outcomes in children with autism spectrum disorder. The American Journal of Occupational Therapy, 62(5), 564–573.
Baranek, G. T., David, F. J., Poe, M. D., Stone, W. L., & Watson, L. R. (2006). Sensory Experiences Questionnaire: Discriminating sensory features in young children with autism, developmental delays, and typical development. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 47(6), 591–601.
Baruth, J. M., Casanova, M. F., Sears, L., & Sokhadze, E. (2010). Early-stage visual processing abnormalities in high-functioning autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Translational Neuroscience, 1(2), 177–187.
Baum, S. H., Stevenson, R. A., & Wallace, M. T. (2015). Behavioral, perceptual, and neural alterations in sensory and multisensory function in autism spectrum disorder. Progress in Neurobiology, 134, 140–160.
Beker, S., Foxe, J. J., & Molholm, S. (2018). Ripe for solution: Delayed development of multisensory processing in autism and its remediation. Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews, 84, 182–192.
Bennetto, L., Keith, J. M., Allen, P. D., & Luebke, A. E. (2017). Children with autism spectrum disorder have reduced otoacoustic emissions at the 1 kHz mid-frequency region. Autism Research, 10(2), 337–145.
Ben-Sasson, A., Hen, L., Fluss, R., Cermak, S. A., Engel-Yeger, B., & Gal, E. (2009). A meta-analysis of sensory modulation symptoms in individuals with autism spectrum disorders. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 39(1), 1–11.
Berman, J. I., Edgar, J. C., Blaskey, L., Kuschner, E. S., Levy, S. E., Ku, M., Dell, J., & Roberts, T. P. L. (2016). Multimodal diffusion-MRI and MEG assessment of auditory and language system development in autism spectrum disorder. Frontiers in Neuroanatomy, 10, 30.
Bertone, A., Mottron, L., Jelenic, P., & Faubert, J. (2005). Enhanced and diminished visuo-spatial information processing in autism depends on stimulus complexity. Brain, 128(10), 2430–2441.
Blake, R., Turner, L. M., Smoski, M. J., Pozdol, S. L., & Stone, W. L. (2003). Visual recognition of biological motion is impaired in children with autism. Psychological Science, 14(2), 151–157.
Bonnel, A., Mottron, L., Peretz, I., Trudel, M., Gallun, E., & Bonnel, A.-M. (2003). Enhanced pitch sensitivity in individuals with autism: A signal detection analysis. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 15(2), 226–235.
Bonnel, A., McAdams, S., Smith, B., Berthiaume, C., Bertone, A., Ciocca, V., Burack, J. A., & Mottron, L. (2010). Enhanced pure-tone pitch discrimination among persons with autism but not Asperger syndrome. Neuropsychologia, 48(9), 2465–2475.
Boyd, B. A., Baranek, G. T., Sideris, J., Poe, M. D., Watson, L. R., Patten, E., & Miller, H. (2010). Sensory features and repetitive behaviors in children with autism and developmental delays. Autism Research, 3(2), 78–87.
Brandwein, A. B., Foxe, J. J., Butler, J. S., Russo, N. N., Altschuler, T. S., Gomes, H., & Molholm, S. (2013). The development of multisensory integration in high-functioning autism: High-density electrical mapping and psychophysical measures reveal impairments in the processing of audiovisual inputs. Cerebral Cortex, 23(6), 1329–1341.
Brock, J., Brown, C. C., Boucher, J., & Rippon, G. (2002). The temporal binding deficit hypothesis of autism. Development and Psychopathology, 14(2), 209–224.
Canolty, R. T., & Knight, R. T. (2010). The functional role of cross-frequency coupling. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 14(11), 506–515.
Chambon, V., Farrer, C., Pacherie, E., Jacquet, P. O., Leboyer, M., & Zalla, T. (2017). Reduced sensitivity to social priors during action prediction in adults with autism spectrum disorders. Cognition, 160, 17–26.
Christison-Lagay, K. L., Gifford, A. M., & Cohen, Y. E. (2015). Neural correlates of auditory scene analysis and perception. International Journal of Psychophysiology, 95(2), 238–245.
Corbett, B. A., Carmean, V., Ravizza, S., Wendelken, C., Henry, M. L., Carter, C., & Rivera, S. M. (2009). A functional and structural study of emotion and face processing in children with autism. Psychiatry Research: Neuroimaging, 173(3), 196–205.
Corbett, B. A., Newsom, C., Key, A. P., Qualls, L. R., & Edmiston, E. (2014). Examining the relationship between face processing and social interaction behavior in children with and without autism spectrum disorder. Journal of Neurodevelopmental Disorders, 6(1), 35.
Corbetta, M., & Shulman, G. L. (2002). Control of goal-directed and stimulus-driven attention in the brain. Nature Reviews Neuroscience, 3(3), 215–229.
Cornew, L., Roberts, T. P. L., Blaskey, L., & Edgar, J. C. (2012). Resting-state oscillatory activity in autism spectrum disorders. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 42(9), 1884–1894.
Crane, L., Goddard, L., & Pring, L. (2009). Sensory processing in adults with autism spectrum disorders. Autism, 13(3), 215–228.
Croydon, A., Karaminis, T., Neil, L., Burr, D., & Pellicano, E. (2017). The light-from-above prior is intact in autistic children. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 161, 113–125.
Cygan, H. B., Tacikowski, P., Ostaszewski, P., Chojnicka, I., & Nowicka, A. (2014). Neural correlates of own name and own face detection in autism spectrum disorder. PLoS One, 9(1), e86020.
Dakin, S., & Frith, U. (2005). Vagaries of visual perception in autism. Neuron, 48(3), 497–507.
de Boer-Schellekens, L., Eussen, M., & Vroomen, J. (2013a). Diminished sensitivity of audiovisual temporal order in autism spectrum disorder. Frontiers in Integrative Neuroscience, 7, 8.
de Boer-Schellekens, L., Keetels, M., Eussen, M., & Vroomen, J. (2013b). No evidence for impaired multisensory integration of low-level audiovisual stimuli in adolescents and young adults with autism spectrum disorders. Neuropsychologia, 51(14), 30043013.
Demopoulos, C., & Lewine, J. D. (2016). Audiometric profiles in autism spectrum disorders: Does subclinical hearing loss impact communication? Autism Research, 9(1), 107–120.
DePape, A.-M. R., Hall, G. B. C., Tillmann, B., & Trainor, L. J. (2012). Auditory processing in high-functioning adolescents with autism spectrum disorder. PLoS One, 7(9), e44084.
Du, Y., Buchsbaum, B. R., Grady, C. L., & Alain, C. (2014). Noise differentially impacts phoneme representations in the auditory and speech motor systems. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 111(19), 7126–7131.
Duerden, E. G., Oatley, H. K., Mak-Fan, K. M., McGrath, P. A., Taylor, M. J., Szatmari, P., & Roberts, S. W. (2012). Risk factors associated with self-injurious behaviors in children and adolescents with autism spectrum disorders. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 42(11), 2460–2470.
Eyler, L. T., Pierce, K., & Courchesne, E. (2012). A failure of left temporal cortex to specialize for language is an early emerging and fundamental property of autism. Brain, 135(3), 949–960.
Falck-Ytter, T., Bölte, S., Gredebäck, G., Klin, A., Martinez-Conde, S., Pollick, F., Bolton, P., Charman, T., Baird, G., Johnson, M., Gerig, G., Hazlett, H., Schultz, R., Styner, M., Zwaigenbaum, L., & Piven, J. (2013). Eye tracking in early autism research. Journal of Neurodevelopmental Disorders, 5(1), 28.
Fan, Y.-T., & Cheng, Y. (2014). Atypical mismatch negativity in response to emotional voices in people with autism spectrum conditions. PLoS One, 9(7), e102471.
Flevaris, A. V., & Murray, S. O. (2014). Orientation-specific surround suppression in the primary visual cortex varies as a function of autistic tendency. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, 8, 1017.
Floris, D. L., Barber, A. D., Nebel, M. B., Martinelli, M., Lai, M.-C., Crocetti, D., Baron-Cohen, S., Suckling, J., Pekar, J. J., & Mostofsky, S. H. (2016). Atypical lateralization of motor circuit functional connectivity in children with autism is associated with motor deficits. Molecular Autism, 7(1), 35.
Foss-Feig, J. H., Kwakye, L. D., Cascio, C. J., Burnette, C. P., Kadivar, H., Stone, W. L., & Wallace, M. T. (2010). An extended multisensory temporal binding window in autism spectrum disorders. Experimental Brain Research, 203(2), 381–389.
Foss-Feig, J. H., Tadin, D., Schauder, K. B., & Cascio, C. J. (2013). A substantial and unexpected enhancement of motion perception in autism. The Journal of Neuroscience, 33(19), 8243–8249.
Foss-Feig, J. H., McGugin, R. W., Gauthier, I., Mash, L. E., Ventola, P., & Cascio, C. J. (2016). A functional neuroimaging study of fusiform response to restricted interests in children and adolescents with autism spectrum disorder. Journal of Neurodevelopmental Disorders, 8, 15.
Foxe, J. J., Molholm, S., Del Bene, V. A., Frey, H.-P., Russo, N. N., Blanco, D., Saint-Amour, D., & Ross, L. A. (2015). Severe multisensory speech integration deficits in high-functioning school-aged children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and their resolution during early adolescence. Cerebral Cortex, 25(2), 298–312.
Frazier, T. W., Strauss, M., Klingemier, E. W., Zetzer, E. E., Hardan, A. Y., Eng, C., & Youngstrom, E. A. (2017). A meta-analysis of gaze differences to social and nonsocial information between individuals with and without autism. Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 56(7), 546555.
Frey, H.-P., Molholm, S., Lalor, E. C., Russo, N. N., & Foxe, J. J. (2013). Atypical cortical representation of peripheral visual space in children with an autism spectrum disorder. European Journal of Neuroscience, 38(1), 2125–2138.
Gervais, H., Belin, P., Boddaert, N., Leboyer, M., Coez, A., Sfaello, I., Barthélémy, C., Brunelle, F., Samson, Y., & Zilbovicius, M. (2004). Abnormal cortical voice processing in autism. Nature Neuroscience, 7(8), 801–802.
Glover, G. H. (2011). Overview of functional magnetic resonance imaging. Neurosurgery Clinics of North America, 22(2), 133–139.
Gomot, M., Belmonte, M. K., Bullmore, E. T., Bernard, F. A., & Baron-Cohen, S. (2008). Brain hyper-reactivity to auditory novel targets in children with high-functioning autism. Brain, 131(9), 2479–2488.
Guiraud, J. A., Kushnerenko, E., Tomalski, P., Davies, K., Ribeiro, H., Johnson, M. H., & BASIS Team. (2011). Differential habituation to repeated sounds in infants at high risk for autism. Neuroreport, 22(16), 845–849.
Haigh, S. M., Heeger, D. J., Heller, L. M., Gupta, A., Dinstein, I., Minshew, N. J., & Behrmann, M. (2016). No difference in cross-modal attention or sensory discrimination thresholds in autism and matched controls. Vision Research, 121, 85–94.
Happé, F. (1999). Autism: Cognitive deficit or cognitive style? Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 3(6), 216–222.
Harris, H., Israeli, D., Minshew, N., Bonneh, Y., Heeger, D. J., Behrmann, M., & Sagi, D. (2015). Perceptual learning in autism: Over-specificity and possible remedies. Nature Neuroscience, 18(11), 1574–1576.
Hazlett, H. C., Gu, H., Munsell, B. C., Kim, S. H., Styner, M., Wolff, J. J., Elison, J. T., Swanson, M. R., Zhu, H., Botteron, K. N., Collins, D. L., Constantino, J. N., Dager, S. R., Estes, A. M., Evans, A. C., Fonov, V. S., Gerig, G., Kostopoulos, P., McKinstry, R. C., Pandey, J., Paterson, S., Pruett, J. R., Schultz, R. T., Shaw, D. W., Zwaigenbaum, L., Piven, J., & The IBIS Network. (2017). Early brain development in infants at high risk for autism spectrum disorder. Nature, 542(7641), 348–351.
Heaton, P. (2003). Pitch memory, labelling and disembedding in autism. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 44(4), 543–551.
Heaton, P., Williams, K., Cummins, O., & Happe, F. (2008). Autism and pitch processing splinter skills: A group and subgroup analysis. Autism, 12(2), 203–219.
Herringshaw, A. J., Ammons, C. J., DeRamus, T. P., & Kana, R. K. (2016). Hemispheric differences in language processing in autism spectrum disorders: A meta-analysis of neuroimaging studies. Autism Research, 9(10), 1046–1057.
Hillock-Dunn, A., & Wallace, M. T. (2012). Developmental changes in the multisensory temporal binding window persist into adolescence. Developmental Science, 15(5), 688–696.
Hosozawa, M., Tanaka, K., Shimizu, T., Nakano, T., & Kitazawa, S. (2012). How children with specific language impairment view social situations: An eye tracking study. Pediatrics, 129(6), e1453–e1460.
Hubl, D., Bölte, S., Feineis-Matthews, S., Lanfermann, H., Federspiel, A., Strik, W., Poustka, F., & Dierks, T. (2003). Functional imbalance of visual pathways indicates alternative face processing strategies in autism. Neurology, 61(9), 1232–1237.
Hull, J. V., Jacokes, Z. J., Torgerson, C. M., Irimia, A., & Van Horn, J. D. (2017). Resting-state functional connectivity in autism spectrum disorders: A review. Frontiers in Psychiatry, 7, 205.
Irwin, J. R., Tornatore, L. A., Brancazio, L., & Whalen, D. H. (2011). Can children with autism spectrum disorders “hear” a speaking face? Child Development, 82(5), 1397–1403.
Järvinen-Pasley, A., Pasley, J., & Heaton, P. (2008a). Is the linguistic content of speech less salient than its perceptual features in autism? Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 38(2), 239–248.
Järvinen-Pasley, A., Wallace, G. L., Ramus, F., Happé, F., & Heaton, P. (2008b). Enhanced perceptual processing of speech in autism. Developmental Science, 11(1), 109–121.
Jeste, S. S., Kirkham, N., Senturk, D., Hasenstab, K., Sugar, C., Kupelian, C., Baker, E., Sanders, A. J., Shimizu, C., Norona, A., Paparella, T., Freeman, S. F. N., & Johnson, S. P. (2015). Electrophysiological evidence of heterogeneity in visual statistical learning in young children with ASD. Developmental Science, 18(1), 90–105.
Jochaut, D., Lehongre, K., Saitovitch, A., Devauchelle, A.-D., Olasagasti, I., Chabane, N., Zilbovicius, M., & Giraud, A.-L. (2015). Atypical coordination of cortical oscillations in response to speech in autism. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, 9, 171.
Jones, W., & Klin, A. (2013). Attention to eyes is present but in decline in 2–6-month-old infants later diagnosed with autism. Nature, 504(7480), 427–431.
Jones, C. R. G., Happé, F., Baird, G., Simonoff, E., Marsden, A. J., Tregay, J., Phillips, R. J., Goswami, U., Thomson, J. M., & Charman, T. (2009). Auditory discrimination and auditory sensory behaviours in autism spectrum disorders. Neuropsychologia, 47(13), 2850–2858.
Kana, R. K., Libero, L. E., Hu, C. P., Deshpande, H. D., & Colburn, J. S. (2014). Functional brain networks and white matter underlying theory-of-mind in autism. Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, 9(1), 98–105.
Keehn, B., Vogel-Farley, V., Tager-Flusberg, H., & Nelson, C. A. (2015). Atypical hemispheric specialization for faces in infants at risk for autism spectrum disorder. Autism Research, 8(2), 187–198.
Keil, A., Müller, M. M., Ray, W. J., Gruber, T., & Elbert, T. (1999). Human gamma band activity and perception of a gestalt. The Journal of Neuroscience, 19(16), 7152–7161.
Kleinhans, N. M., Müller, R.-A., Cohen, D. N., & Courchesne, E. (2008). Atypical functional lateralization of language in autism spectrum disorders. Brain Research, 1221, 115–125.
Klimesch, W., Sauseng, P., & Hanslmayr, S. (2007). EEG alpha oscillations: The inhibition-timing hypothesis. Brain Research Reviews, 53(1), 63–88.
Koh, H. C., Milne, E., & Dobkins, K. (2010). Spatial contrast sensitivity in adolescents with autism spectrum disorders. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 40(8), 978–987.
Kröger, A., Bletsch, A., Krick, C., Siniatchkin, M., Jarczok, T. A., Freitag, C. M., & Bender, S. (2014). Visual event-related potentials to biological motion stimuli in autism spectrum disorders. Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, 9(8), 1214–1222.
Larrain-Valenzuela, J., Zamorano, F., Soto-Icaza, P., Carrasco, X., Herrera, C., Daiber, F., Aboitiz, F., & Billeke, P. (2017). Theta and alpha oscillation impairments in autistic spectrum disorder reflect working memory deficit. Scientific Reports, 7(1), 14328.
Lawson, R. P., Mathys, C., & Rees, G. (2017). Adults with autism overestimate the volatility of the sensory environment. Nature Neuroscience, 20(9), 1293–1299.
Lee, A. K. C., Larson, E., Maddox, R. K., & Shinn-Cunningham, B. G. (2014). Using neuroimaging to understand the cortical mechanisms of auditory selective attention. Hearing Research, 307, 111–120.
Lee, Y., Park, B., James, O., Kim, S.-G., & Park, H. (2017). Autism spectrum disorder related functional connectivity changes in the language network in children, adolescents and adults. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, 11, 418.
Lepistö, T., Kuitunen, A., Sussman, E., Saalasti, S., Jansson-Verkasalo, E., Nieminen-von Wendt, T., & Kujala, T. (2009). Auditory stream segregation in children with Asperger syndrome. Biological Psychology, 82(3), 301–307.
Levin, A. R., Varcin, K. J., O’Leary, H. M., Tager-Flusberg, H., & Nelson, C. A. (2017). EEG power at 3 months in infants at high familial risk for autism. Journal of Neurodevelopmental Disorders, 9(1), 34.
Lin, I.-F., Shirama, A., Kato, N., & Kashino, M. (2017). The singular nature of auditory and visual scene analysis in autism. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 372(1714), 20160115.
Linke, A. C., Jao Keehn, R. J., Pueschel, E. B., Fishman, I., & Müller, R. A. (2018). Children with ASD show links between aberrant sound processing, social symptoms, and atypical auditory interhemispheric and thalamocortical functional connectivity. Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, 29, 117–126.
Lodhia, V., Brock, J., Johnson, B. W., & Hautus, M. J. (2014). Reduced object related negativity response indicates impaired auditory scene analysis in adults with autistic spectrum disorder. PeerJ, 2, e261.
Lodhia, V., Hautus, M. J., Johnson, B. W., & Brock, J. (2018). Atypical brain responses to auditory spatial cues in adults with autism spectrum disorder. European Journal of Neuroscience, 47(6), 682–689.
Long, Z., Duan, X., Mantini, D., & Chen, H. (2016). Alteration of functional connectivity in autism spectrum disorder: Effect of age and anatomical distance. Scientific Reports, 6(1), 26527.
Lord, C., Risi, S., DiLavore, P. S., Shulman, C., Thurm, A., & Pickles, A. (2006). Autism from 2 to 9 years of age. Archives of General Psychiatry, 63(6), 694–701.
Luyster, R., Gotham, K., Guthrie, W., Coffing, M., Petrak, R., Pierce, K., Bishop, S., Esler, A., Hus, V., Oti, R., Richler, J., Risi, S., & Lord, C. (2009). The Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule-toddler module: A new module of a standardized diagnostic measure for autism spectrum disorders. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 39(9), 1305–1320.
Magnotti, J. F., & Beauchamp, M. S. (2015). The noisy encoding of disparity model of the McGurk effect. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 22(3), 701–709.
Manjaly, Z. M., Bruning, N., Neufang, S., Stephan, K. E., Brieber, S., Marshall, J. C., Kamp-Becker, I., Remschmidt, H., Herpertz-Dahlmann, B., Konrad, K., & Fink, G. R. (2007). Neurophysiological correlates of relatively enhanced local visual search in autistic adolescents. Neuroimage, 35(1), 283–291.
Manning, C., Kilner, J., Neil, L., Karaminis, T., & Pellicano, E. (2017). Children on the autism spectrum update their behaviour in response to a volatile environment. Developmental Science, 20(5), e12435.
Markram, K., & Markram, H. (2010). The intense world theory-a unifying theory of the neurobiology of autism. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, 4, 224.
Mayer, J. L. (2017). The relationship between autistic traits and atypical sensory functioning in neurotypical and ASD adults: A spectrum approach. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 47(2), 316–327.
McGurk, H., & MacDonald, J. (1976). Hearing lips and seeing voices. Nature, 264(5588), 746–748.
McIntosh, D., Miller, L., & Shyu, V. (1999). Development and validation of the short sensory profile. In W. Dunn (Ed.), Sensory Profile: User’s Manual (pp. 59–73). San Antonio: The Psychological Coroporation.
McKay, L. S., Simmons, D. R., McAleer, P., Marjoram, D., Piggot, J., & Pollick, F. E. (2012). Do distinct atypical cortical networks process biological motion information in adults with autism spectrum disorders? Neuroimage, 59(2), 1524–1533.
Miller, M., Iosif, A.-M., Hill, M., Young, G. S., Schwichtenberg, A. J., & Ozonoff, S. (2017). Response to name in infants developing autism spectrum disorder: A prospective study. The Journal of Pediatrics, 183, 141–146.e1.
Milne, E. (2011). Increased intra-participant variability in children with autistic spectrum disorders: Evidence from single-trial analysis of evoked EEG. Frontiers in Psychology, 2, 51.
Modi, M. E., & Sahin, M. (2017). Translational use of event-related potentials to assess circuit integrity in ASD. Nature Reviews Neurology, 13(3), 160–170.
Murphy, P., Brady, N., Fitzgerald, M., & Troje, N. F. (2009). No evidence for impaired perception of biological motion in adults with autistic spectrum disorders. Neuropsychologia, 47(14), 3225–3235.
Murphy, J. W., Foxe, J. J., Peters, J. B., & Molholm, S. (2014). Susceptibility to distraction in autism spectrum disorder: Probing the integrity of oscillatory alpha-band suppression mechanisms. Autism Research, 7(4), 442–458.
Nackaerts, E., Wagemans, J., Helsen, W., Swinnen, S. P., Wenderoth, N., & Alaerts, K. (2012). Recognizing biological motion and emotions from point-light displays in autism spectrum disorders. PLoS One, 7(9), e44473.
Nagae, L. M., Zarnow, D. M., Blaskey, L., Dell, J., Khan, S. Y., Qasmieh, S., Levy, S. E., & Roberts, T. P. L. (2012). Elevated mean diffusivity in the left hemisphere superior longitudinal fasciculus in autism spectrum disorders increases with more profound language impairment. American Journal of Neuroradiology, 33(9), 1720–1725.
Nagy, E., & Loveland, K. A. (2002). Prolonged brainstem auditory evoked potentials: An autism-specific or autism-nonspecific marker. Archives of General Psychiatry, 59(3), 288–890.
Neumann, D., Spezio, M. L., Piven, J., & Adolphs, R. (2006). Looking you in the mouth: Abnormal gaze in autism resulting from impaired top-down modulation of visual attention. Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, 1(3), 194–202.
Noris, B., Nadel, J., Barker, M., Hadjikhani, N., & Billard, A. (2012). Investigating gaze of children with ASD in naturalistic settings. PLoS One, 7(9), e44144.
O’Riordan, M., & Passetti, F. (2006). Discrimination in autism within different sensory modalities. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 36(5), 665–675.
Ozonoff, S., Young, G. S., Carter, A., Messinger, D., Yirmiya, N., Zwaigenbaum, L., Bryson, S., Carver, L. J., Constantino, J. N., Dobkins, K., Hutman, T., Iverson, J. M., Landa, R., Rogers, S. J., Sigman, M., & Stone, W. L. (2011). Recurrence risk for autism spectrum disorders: A Baby Siblings Research Consortium study. Pediatrics, 128(3), e488–e495.
Pack, C. C., Hunter, J. N., & Born, R. T. (2005). Contrast dependence of suppressive influences in cortical area MT of alert macaque. Journal of Neurophysiology, 93(3), 1809–1815.
Palmer, C. J., Lawson, R. P., & Hohwy, J. (2017). Bayesian approaches to autism: Towards volatility, action, and behavior. Psychological Bulletin, 143(5), 521–542.
Patten, E., Watson, L. R., & Baranek, G. T. (2014). Temporal synchrony detection and associations with language in young children with ASD. Autism Research and Treatment, 2014, 1–8.
Pei, F., Baldassi, S., & Norcia, A. M. (2014). Electrophysiological measures of low-level vision reveal spatial processing deficits and hemispheric asymmetry in autism spectrum disorder. Journal of Vision, 14(11).
Peiker, I., David, N., Schneider, T. R., Nolte, G., Schottle, D., & Engel, A. K. (2015). Perceptual integration deficits in autism spectrum disorders are associated with reduced interhemispheric gamma-band coherence. The Journal of Neuroscience, 35(50), 16352–16361.
Pell, P. J., Mareschal, I., Calder, A. J., von dem Hagen, E. A. H., Clifford, C. W. G., Baron-Cohen, S., & Ewbank, M. P. (2016). Intact priors for gaze direction in adults with high-functioning autism spectrum conditions. Molecular Autism, 7(1), 25.
Pellicano, E., & Burr, D. (2012). When the world becomes “too real”: A Bayesian explanation of autistic perception. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 16(10), 504–510.
Pellicano, E., Gibson, L., Maybery, M., Durkin, K., & Badcock, D. R. (2005). Abnormal global processing along the dorsal visual pathway in autism: A possible mechanism for weak visuospatial coherence? Neuropsychologia, 43(7), 1044–1053.
Pellicano, E., Smith, A. D., Cristino, F., Hood, B. M., Briscoe, J., & Gilchrist, I. D. (2011). Children with autism are neither systematic nor optimal foragers. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 108(1), 421–426.
Pierce, K., Marinero, S., Hazin, R., McKenna, B., Barnes, C. C., & Malige, A. (2016). Eye tracking reveals abnormal visual preference for geometric images as an early biomarker of an autism spectrum disorder subtype associated with increased symptom severity. Biological Psychiatry, 79(8), 657–666.
Plaisted, K., Swettenham, J., & Rees, L. (1999). Children with autism show local precedence in a divided attention task and global precedence in a selective attention task. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 40(5), 733–742.
Remington, A., & Fairnie, J. (2017). A sound advantage: Increased auditory capacity in autism. Cognition, 166, 459–465.
Rice, K., Moriuchi, J. M., Jones, W., & Klin, A. (2012). Parsing heterogeneity in autism spectrum disorders: Visual scanning of dynamic social scenes in school-aged children. Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, 51(3), 238–248.
Rogers, S. J., & Ozonoff, S. (2005). Annotation: What do we know about sensory dysfunction in autism? A critical review of the empirical evidence. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 46(12), 1255–1268.
Romei, V., Gross, J., & Thut, G. (2012). Sounds reset rhythms of visual cortex and corresponding human visual perception. Current Biology, 22(9), 807–813.
Ross, L. A., Saint-Amour, D., Leavitt, V. M., Javitt, D. C., & Foxe, J. J. (2006). Do you see what I am saying? Exploring visual enhancement of speech comprehension in noisy environments. Cerebral Cortex, 17(5), 1147–1153.
Ross, L. A., Del Bene, V. A., Molholm, S., Jae Woo, Y., Andrade, G. N., Abrahams, B. S., & Foxe, J. J. (2017). Common variation in the autism risk gene CNTNAP2, brain structural connectivity and multisensory speech integration. Brain and Language, 174, 50–60.
Samson, F., Hyde, K. L., Bertone, A., Soulières, I., Mendrek, A., Ahad, P., Mottron, L., & Zeffiro, T. A. (2011). Atypical processing of auditory temporal complexity in autistics. Neuropsychologia, 49(3), 546–555.
Sasson, N. J. (2006). The development of face processing in autism. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 36(3), 381–394.
Schaaf, R. C., & Lane, A. E. (2015). Toward a best-practice protocol for assessment of sensory features in ASD. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 45(5), 1380–1395.
Schelinski, S., Borowiak, K., & von Kriegstein, K. (2016). Temporal voice areas exist in autism spectrum disorder but are dysfunctional for voice identity recognition. Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, 11(11), 1812–1822.
Scherf, K. S., Elbich, D., Minshew, N., & Behrmann, M. (2015). Individual differences in symptom severity and behavior predict neural activation during face processing in adolescents with autism. Neuroimage: Clinical, 7, 53–67.
Seery, A. M., Vogel-Farley, V., Tager-Flusberg, H., & Nelson, C. A. (2013). Atypical lateralization of ERP response to native and non-native speech in infants at risk for autism spectrum disorder. Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, 5, 10–24.
Seery, A. M., Tager-Flusberg, H., & Nelson, C. A. (2014). Event-related potentials to repeated speech in 9-month-old infants at risk for autism spectrum disorder. Journal of Neurodevelopmental Disorders, 6(1), 43.
Shams, L., & Beierholm, U. R. (2010). Causal inference in perception. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 14(9), 425–432.
Shams, L., Kamitani, Y., & Shimojo, S. (2000). Illusions: What you see is what you hear. Nature, 408(6814), 788.
Sharda, M., Midha, R., Malik, S., Mukerji, S., & Singh, N. C. (2015). Fronto-temporal connectivity is preserved during sung but not spoken word listening, across the autism spectrum. Autism Research, 8(2), 174–186.
Shinn-Cunningham, B., Best, V., & Lee, A. K. C. (2017). Auditory object formation and selection. In J. C. Middlebrooks, J. Z. Simon, A. N. Popper, & R. R. Fay (Eds.), The Auditory System at the Cocktail Party (pp. 7–40). New York: Springer.
Shirama, A., Kato, N., & Kashino, M. (2016). When do individuals with autism spectrum disorder show superiority in visual search? Autism, 21(8), 942–951.
Simmons, D. R., Robertson, A. E., McKay, L. S., Toal, E., McAleer, P., & Pollick, F. E. (2009). Vision in autism spectrum disorders. Vision Research, 49(22), 2705–2739.
Simon, D. M., & Wallace, M. T. (2016). Dysfunction of sensory oscillations in autism spectrum disorder. Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews, 68, 848–861.
Simon, D. M., Damiano, C. R., Woynaroski, T. G., Ibañez, L. V., Murias, M., Stone, W. L., Wallace, M. T., & Cascio, C. J. (2017). Neural correlates of sensory hyporesponsiveness in toddlers at high risk for autism spectrum disorder. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 47(9), 2710–2722.
Snijders, T. M., Milivojevic, B., & Kemner, C. (2013). Atypical excitation-inhibition balance in autism captured by the gamma response to contextual modulation. Neuroimage: Clinical, 3, 65–72.
Stevenson, R. A., & Wallace, M. T. (2013). Multisensory temporal integration: Task and stimulus dependencies. Experimental Brain Research, 227(2), 249–261.
Stevenson, R. A., Siemann, J. K., Schneider, B. C., Eberly, H. E., Woynaroski, T. G., Camarata, S. M., & Wallace, M. T. (2014a). Multisensory temporal integration in autism spectrum disorders. The Journal of Neuroscience, 34(3), 691–697.
Stevenson, R. A., Siemann, J. K., Woynaroski, T. G., Schneider, B. C., Eberly, H. E., Camarata, S. M., & Wallace, M. T. (2014b). Evidence for diminished multisensory integration in autism spectrum disorders. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 44(12), 3161–3167.
Stevenson, R. A., Siemann, J. K., Woynaroski, T. G., Schneider, B. C., Eberly, H. E., Camarata, S. M., & Wallace, M. T. (2014c). Brief report: Arrested development of audiovisual speech perception in autism spectrum disorders. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 44(6), 1470–1477.
Stevenson, R. A., Baum, S. H., Segers, M., Ferber, S., Barense, M. D., & Wallace, M. T. (2017). Multisensory speech perception in autism spectrum disorder: From phoneme to whole-word perception. Autism Research, 10(7), 1280–1290.
Sumby, W. H., & Pollack, I. (1954). Visual contribution to speech intelligibility in noise. The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 26(2), 212–215.
Swettenham, J., Remington, A., Laing, K., Fletcher, R., Coleman, M., & Gomez, J.-C. (2013). Perception of pointing from biological motion point-light displays in typically developing children and children with autism spectrum disorder. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 43(6), 1437–1446.
Sysoeva, O. V., Galuta, I. A., Davletshina, M. S., Orekhova, E. V., & Stroganova, T. A. (2017). Abnormal size-dependent modulation of motion perception in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Frontiers in Neuroscience, 11, 164.
Tadin, D., & Lappin, J. S. (2005). Optimal size for perceiving motion decreases with contrast. Vision Research, 45(16), 2059–2064.
Thomas, C., Humphreys, K., Jung, K.-J., Minshew, N., & Behrmann, M. (2011). The anatomy of the callosal and visual-association pathways in high-functioning autism: A DTI tractography study. Cortex, 47(7), 863–873.
Thorne, J. D., De Vos, M., Viola, F. C., & Debener, S. (2011). Cross-modal phase reset predicts auditory task performance in humans. The Journal of Neuroscience, 31(10), 3853–3861.
Tierney, A. L., Gabard-Durnam, L., Vogel-Farley, V., Tager-Flusberg, H., & Nelson, C. A. (2012). Developmental trajectories of testing EEG power: An endophenotype of autism spectrum disorder. PLoS One, 7(6), e39127.
Van de Cruys, S., Evers, K., Van der Hallen, R., Van Eylen, L., Boets, B., De-Wit, L., & Wagemans, J. (2014). Precise minds in uncertain worlds: Predictive coding in autism. Psychological Review, 121(4), 649–675.
Vandenbroucke, M. W. G., Scholte, H. S., van Engeland, H., Lamme, V. A. F., & Kemner, C. (2008). A neural substrate for atypical low-level visual processing in autism spectrum disorder. Brain, 131(4), 1013–1024.
Venezia, J. H., Vaden, K. I., Rong, F., Maddox, D., Saberi, K., & Hickok, G. (2017). Auditory, visual and audiovisual speech processing streams in superior temporal sulcus. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, 11, 174.
Ververi, A., Vargiami, E., Papadopoulou, V., Tryfonas, D., & Zafeiriou, D. (2015). Brainstem auditory evoked potentials in boys with autism: Still searching for the hidden truth. Iranian Journal of Child Neurology, 9(2), 21–28.
Wang, J., Barstein, J., Ethridge, L. E., Mosconi, M. W., Takarae, Y., & Sweeney, J. A. (2013). Resting state EEG abnormalities in autism spectrum disorders. Journal of Neurodevelopmental Disorders, 5(1), 24.
Watson, L. R., Patten, E., Baranek, G. T., Poe, M., Boyd, B. A., Freuler, A., & Lorenzi, J. (2011). Differential associations between sensory response patterns and language, social, and communication measures in children with autism or other developmental disabilities. Journal of Speech Language and Hearing Research, 54(6), 1562–1576.
Webb, S. J., Merkle, K., Murias, M., Richards, T., Aylward, E., & Dawson, G. (2012). ERP responses differentiate inverted but not upright face processing in adults with ASD. Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, 7(5), 578–587.
Welch, R. B. (1999). Meaning, attention, and the “unity assumption” in the intersensory bias of spatial and temporal perceptions. In G. Aschersleben, T. Bachmann, & J. Musseler (Eds.), Cognitive contributions to the perception of spatial and temporal events (pp. 371–387). Amsterdam: Elsevier.
Woynaroski, T. G., Kwakye, L. D., Foss-Feig, J. H., Stevenson, R. A., Stone, W. L., & Wallace, M. T. (2013). Multisensory speech perception in children with autism spectrum disorders. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 43(12), 2891–2902.
Yamasaki, T., Maekawa, T., Fujita, T., & Tobimatsu, S. (2017). Connectopathy in autism spectrum disorders: A review of evidence from visual evoked potentials and diffusion magnetic resonance imaging. Frontiers in Neuroscience, 11, 627.
Zalla, T., Fernandez, L. G., Pieron, M., Seassau, M., & Leboyer, M. (2016). Reduced saccadic inhibition of return to moving eyes in autism spectrum disorders. Vision Research, 127, 115–121.
Compliance with Ethics Requirements
Sarah H. Baum Miller declares that she has no conflicts of interest.
Mark T. Wallace declares that he has no conflicts of interest.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2019 Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Baum Miller, S.H., Wallace, M.T. (2019). Multisensory Processing Differences in Individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder. In: Lee, A., Wallace, M., Coffin, A., Popper, A., Fay, R. (eds) Multisensory Processes. Springer Handbook of Auditory Research, vol 68. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-10461-0_12
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-10461-0_12
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-10459-7
Online ISBN: 978-3-030-10461-0
eBook Packages: Biomedical and Life SciencesBiomedical and Life Sciences (R0)