Using eye-tracking methods, researchers at the UC San Diego School of Medicine have shown that toddlers with autism spend significantly more time visually examining dynamic geometric patterns than they do looking at social images — a viewing pattern not found in either typical or developmentally delayed toddlers. The results of the study suggest that a preference for geometric patterns early in life may be a signature behavior in infants who are at risk for autism. This preference was found in infants at-risk for autism as young as 14 months of age.
“In testing 110 toddlers ages 14 to 42 months, we found that all of the toddlers who spent more than 69 percent of their time fixing their gaze on geometric images could be accurately classified as having an autism spectrum disorder or ASD,” said Karen Pierce, an assistant professor in the UC San Diego Department of Neurosciences and assistant director of the UC San Diego Autism Center of Excellence. The study is published in the Sept. 6 issue of the Archives of General Psychiatry.
Out of 51 typical infants in this study, only one preferred to look at the geometric images. However, not all autistic toddlers preferred the geometric shapes. In the UC San Diego study, 40 percent of the ASD toddlers had this preference, compared with just 2 percent of the typical and 9 percent of the developmentally delayed toddlers. Thus, while 40 percent of the ASD toddlers were “geometric responders,” the remaining 60 percent were similar to the typical and developmentally delayed groups in preferring dynamic social images.
“What an infant prefers to look at when given a choice between two images may turn out to be a more clearly observable indicator of autism risk than how he or she looks at a single image,” Pierce said. “Among toddlers who strongly prefer geometric patterns, we found that almost 100 percent of the time, those children developed an autism spectrum disorder.”
Recent Comments