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Distance from Typical Scan Path When Viewing Complex Stimuli in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder and its Association with Behavior

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Abstract

Eye-tracking is often used to study attention in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Previous research has identified multiple atypical patterns of attention in children with ASD based on areas-of-interest analysis. Fewer studies have investigated gaze path, a measure which is dependent on the dynamic content of the stimulus presented. Here, rather than looking at proportions of looking time to areas of interest, we calculated mean fixations frame-by-frame in a group of typically developing children (36 to 72 months) and determined the distance from those typical fixations for 155 children with ASD (27–95 months). Findings revealed that distance from the typical scan path among the children with ASD was associated with lower communication abilities and greater ASD symptomatology.

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Acknowledgements

This research was supported by grants from NICHD P50HD093074, the Marcus Foundation, and a NARSAD Young Investigator Grant from the Brain & Behavior Research Foundation (#23807). We thank Fred Shic, PhD for his input on this work.

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Author notes

  1. Michael Murias

    Present address: Medical Social Sciences, Northwestern University, Chicago, IL, 60622, USA

  2. Elena J. Tenenbaum and Samantha Major had equal contribution.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Duke Center for Autism and Brain Development, Duke University, Durham, NC, 27705, USA

    Elena J. Tenenbaum, Samantha Major, Kimberly L. H. Carpenter, Jill Howard, Michael Murias & Geraldine Dawson

  2. Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, NC, 27705, USA

    Elena J. Tenenbaum, Kimberly L. H. Carpenter & Geraldine Dawson

  3. Duke Institute for Brain Sciences, Duke University, Durham, NC, 27708, USA

    Elena J. Tenenbaum, Kimberly L. H. Carpenter & Geraldine Dawson

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  1. Elena J. Tenenbaum
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Correspondence to Elena J. Tenenbaum.

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Conflict of interest

Dr. Dawson is on the Scientific Advisory Boards of Janssen Research and Development, Akili, Inc, LabCorp, Inc, Roche Pharmaceutical Company, and Tris Pharma, and is a consultant to Apple, Gerson Lehrman Group, Guidepoint, Inc, Axial Ventures, Teva Pharmaceutical, and is CEO of DASIO, LLC. Dr. Dawson has received book royalties from Guilford Press, Oxford University Press, Springer Nature Press. In addition, Dr. Dawson has the following patent applications: 1802952, 1802942, 15141391, and 16493754. Dawson and Carpenter helped develop technology for early screening for ASD. The technology has been licensed and Dawson, Carpenter, and Duke University have benefited financially. Dr. Howard reports personal fees from Roche.

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Video shows the full stimulus overlain with the mean fixations frame-by-frame. Blue indicates the mean for the TD group. Red indicates mean fixation for the ASD participants. Boxes show standard deviation for X and Y axes.

Electronic supplementary material 2 (MP4 14480 kb)

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Tenenbaum, E.J., Major, S., Carpenter, K.L.H. et al. Distance from Typical Scan Path When Viewing Complex Stimuli in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder and its Association with Behavior. J Autism Dev Disord 51, 3492–3505 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-020-04812-w

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