Abstract
Difficulty listening in noisy environments is a common complaint of individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). However, the mechanisms underlying such auditory processing challenges are unknown. This preliminary study investigated auditory attention deployment in adults with ASD. Participants were instructed to maintain or switch attention between two simultaneous speech streams in three conditions: location (co-located versus ± 30° separation), voice (same voice versus male–female contrast), and both cues together. Results showed that individuals with ASD can selectively direct attention using location or voice cues, but performance was best when both cues were present. In comparison to neurotypical adults, overall performance was less accurate across all conditions. These findings warrant further investigation into auditory attention deployment differences in individuals with ASD.
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Acknowledgments
We thank Raleigh Davis for assistance with data collection. AKCL, AE, SD, EL, DM, TSJ and BKL contributed to the study conception and design. Material preparation, data collection and analysis were performed by KE, EL, DM and BKL. The first draft of the manuscript was written by KE and BKL and all authors commented on previous versions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
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Emmons, K.A., KC Lee, A., Estes, A. et al. Auditory Attention Deployment in Young Adults with Autism Spectrum Disorder. J Autism Dev Disord 52, 1752–1761 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-021-05076-8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-021-05076-8