Neurocognitive Mechanisms underlying Episodic Memory Functioning in children with Autism Spectrum Disorder

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Project Summary Children and adolescents with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) show deficits in episodic memory, even when they perform within the typical range in assessments of general intellectual functioning. However, no unifying theory has been able to fully capture the nature of these deficits. Most of the currently available accounts emphasize difficulties with complex cognitive abilities suggesting that fragmentary knowledge structures about the self and the world may not provide sufficient foundation for children and adolescents with ASD to retain detailed episodic memories. However, some of these memory difficulties may stem from altered visual processing of basic features of events (e.g., information about event location). The proposed research plan seeks to bridge the gap between the fields of episodic memory and visual processing in ASD, which are believed to be atypical. The proposed application is centered around testing the hypothesis that altered processing in the dorsal visual processing stream is responsible for documented episodic retention for spatial information (Aim 1) and that the behavioral consequences extend to temporal information, but do not extend to event features (e.g., event color or shape) (Aim 2). The pursuit of these aims will provide the opportunity for training in functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) techniques, experimental designs utilized in developmental cognitive neuroscience research, atypical neuroanatomy, neural function in ASD, and potential translational applications of the expected research findings. Relevance for Mental Health. Adolescence is a time of significant cognitive and social change and it is important to establish how those with ASD fare during this period since some evidence suggests that symptoms intensify while other evidence suggests that they may subside. In this context, identifying areas of impaired versus preserved cognitive functioning may be important to recognize aspects of vulnerability and relative strength with implications for adaptive functioning.