Toddlers with autism may focus on co-occurring sounds & motions

It has been proved that 2-year-olds with autism pay more attention to the movements and sounds of a person’s face. An experiment in which each animation in a video game consisted of bright dots that played normally on one side of the screen, and upside down and reverse on the other side, was performed by Ami Klin of Yale University’s Child Study Center and his colleagues, and tested on toddlers with autism and toddlers without. The results came out to be that 39 developing infants and 16 non-autistic toddlers looked at the normal side of the screen; meanwhile, 21 autistic infants looked at the reverse and upside-down part of the screen. In addition, there was another game in which colliding dots represented two hands clapping, but in an upright position, and this, in fact, called the attention of toddlers with autism. Their conclusions lead to a hypothesis, which stated that infants with autism might watch a face, but not experience a person; in other words, reject social signals. Although this is not final, researchers are still arguing whether children with autism will be more social after receiving a treatment directing their attention to the signs of biological motion.

This experiment came form hypothesis based since, because researchers did an experiment to prove that children with autism pay more attention to sounds and motions. These findings are important to humans because it will help society to understand more the actions of children with autism, and also aid autistic toddlers in informing them about future treatment.

Author: Bruce Bower

Title: Toddlers with autism may focus on co-occurring sounds & motions

Journal: Science News

Date: April 25, 2009

Page: 8