No evidence for impaired multisensory integration of low-level audiovisual stimuli in adolescents and young adults with autism spectrum disorders Liselotte de Boer-Schellekens a , Mirjam Keetels a , Mart Eussen b , Jean Vroomen a,n Q1 a Tilburg University, Department of Cognitive Neuropsychology, P.O. Box 90153, 5000 LE, Tilburg, The Netherlands b Yulius Academy, Mathenesserlaan 202, 3014 RH Rotterdam, The Netherlands article info Article history: Received 26 March 2013 Received in revised form 3 October 2013 Accepted 8 October 2013 Keywords Q3 : Autism spectrum disorders Multisensory integration Temporal ventriloquism Visual temporal order Visual search Visual orienting abstract Abrupt click sounds can improve the visual processing of flashes in several ways. Here, we examined this in high functioning adolescents with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) using three tasks: (1) a task where clicks improve sensitivity for visual temporal order (temporal ventriloquism); (2) a task where a click improves visual search (pip-and-pop), and (3) a task where a click speeds up the visual orienting to a peripheral target (clock reading). Adolescents with ASD were, compared to adolescents with typical development (TD), impaired in judgments of visual temporal order, but they were unimpaired in visual search and orienting. Importantly, in all tasks visual performance of the ASD group improved by the presence of clicks by at least equal amounts as in the TD group. This suggests that adolescents and young adults with ASD show no generalized deficit in the multisensory integration of low-level audiovisual stimuli and/or the phasic alerting by abrupt sounds. & 2013 Published by Elsevier Ltd. 1. Introduction Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) are characterized by deficits in social interactions, communication, and by restricted interests and/or repetitive behaviors (APA, 1994). In addition, sensory disturbances have been reported consistently in the clinical literature dating back to Kanner's original description of autism (Kanner, 1943). Indeed, several contemporary theories on ASD reflect the idea that sensory deficits are core symptoms of autism (Crane, Goddard, & Pring, 2009; Kern et al., 2007) that could have downstream effects on the development of the perceptual system (Bertone, Mottron, Jelenic, & Faubert, 2005; Mottron & Burack, 2001). To create a unified percept of the world, the brain has to synthesize a mix of sensory information into one coherent multi- sensory percept. This sensory synthesis is a constantly occurring phenomenon that shapes our view of the world and it is crucial for everyday social and adaptive behavior (Wallace, 2004). Deficits in (multi)sensory processing might lead to aberrant social and adaptive behavior and interaction as known in ASD. There is indeed evidence that people with ASD have impair- ments in (multi)sensory processing. One piece of evidence comes from studies on the multisensory integration (MSI) of speech and emotions as perceived from the face and the voice (Bebko, Weiss, Demark, & Gomez, 2006; Charbonneau et al., 2013; de Gelder, Vroomen, & van der Heide, 1991; Magnée, de Gelder, van Engeland, & Kemner, 2008; Megnin et al., 2012; Mongillo et al., 2008; Smith & Bennetto, 2007). These studies suggest that people with ASD have problems with audiovisual integration of social and emotional stimuli that could account for the atypical social behavior of individuals with ASD. Other studies on MSI of lower- level information like clicks and flashes, though, show opposite results (Foss-Feig et al., 2010; Grossman, Schneps, & Tager- Flusberg, 2009; Keane, Rosenthal, Chun, & Shams, 2010; Kwakye, Foss-Feig, Cascio, Stone, & Wallace, 2011; Magnée, Oranje, van Engeland, Kahn, & Kemner, 2009; Mongillo et al., 2008; Van der Smagt, van Engeland, & Kemner, 2007). This dichotomy between the processing of complex and lower-level stimuli may be in line with the conceptualization of autism as a selective disorder of complex information processing (Minshew, Sweeney, & Luna, 2002). However, a recent study by Brandwein et al. (2012) assessed the integrity of basic audiovisual integration by recording high-density electrophysiology from high-functioning children with ASD while the children performed a simple audiovisual reaction time task. The authors found that children with ASD showed considerably less behavioral facilitation to multisensory inputs. Two other recent studies by Foss-Feig et al. (2010) and Kwakye et al. (2011) showed that, although children with ASD are 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/neuropsychologia Neuropsychologia 0028-3932/$ - see front matter & 2013 Published by Elsevier Ltd. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2013.10.005 n Corresponding author. Tel.: þ31 13 466 2394; fax: þ31 13 466 2067. E-mail addresses: l.w.z.deboer@uvt.nl (L. de Boer-Schellekens), m.n.keetels@uvt.nl (M. Keetels), M.Eussen@yulius.nl (M. Eussen), J.Vroomen@uvt.nl (J. Vroomen). Please cite this article as: de Boer-Schellekens, L., et al. No evidence for impaired multisensory integration of low-level audiovisual stimuli in adolescents and young adults with autism.... 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