Components of Limited Activity Monitoring in Toddlers with ASD

描述(由申请人提供)：患有自闭症谱系障碍(ASD)的儿童在多个领域表现出缺陷，包括联合注意、模仿和模仿。在典型的发展中，这些关键的社交技能取决于监督他人的活动和行动。我们最近的研究表明，患有自闭症的20个月大的幼儿参加的活动比年龄匹配的典型发育期(TD)幼儿和年龄和认知匹配的发育迟缓(DD)幼儿都要少，相反，他们更关注非社会背景元素，如玩具。鉴于当儿童被剥夺了向他人学习的重要途径时可能出现的级联缺陷，迫切需要更好地了解导致典型和非典型活动监测的发育机制。这项建议试图通过研究可能影响20个月的自闭症幼儿和14个月和20个月大的自闭症幼儿的社交、知觉和发展因素来理解为什么患有自闭症的幼儿不那么频繁地监控他人的活动。关于典型的发展，本提案旨在绘制活动监测方面的规范性发展变化图表，并了解这些变化的基础，从而为理解自闭症有限的活动监测提供一个背景。关于自闭症，这项建议试图量化自闭症患者有限的活动监控在多大程度上是由于(1)较少地定向于他人共同关注的地点；(2)对运动线索不那么敏感；以及(3)更容易被知觉分心因素从社交活动中分心。为了回答这些问题，我们向受试者呈现描述两个演员之间的游戏互动的场景，并调节以下因素：(1)演员是否专注于中央共享区域或彼此相互关注；(2)场景是以静态图像还是动态电影的形式显示；以及(3)背景被玩具等干扰物杂乱的程度。为了阐明这些因素的影响，我们还考察了实验条件下的注意模式和自闭症患者的社会认知功能之间的关系。最后，为了更好地理解ASD和TD幼儿活动监测的微观结构，我们在传统的方差分析方法的基础上增加了计算建模和动态分析。在TD儿童快速发展和技能获得的年龄，活动监测的中断可能会严重影响ASD儿童的社会体验。通过了解导致ASD活动监控受限的因素，并通过绘制典型发育中活动监控的变化图表，我们希望能够深入了解ASD中可能发生变化的特定过程。因此，这项工作有可能导致新的结果测量，帮助开发新的工具来分析ASD的异质性，并为ASD早期开发的靶向治疗设计提供信息。 与公共卫生相关：通常，发育中的儿童似乎只是通过观看其他人参与活动来轻松学习；然而，患有自闭症谱系障碍(ASD)的儿童对他人的活动表现出有限的关注，限制了他们的学习能力。这个项目考察了自闭症患者有限的活动监控与对他人凝视和焦点的敏感度、对运动和动态线索的敏感度以及竞争对手对社交注意力的分心之间的关系。通过了解可能有助于有限活动监测的组成部分，并通过了解活动监测典型发展的趋势，该项目有可能帮助开发早期筛查、监测和治疗ASD的新方法。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) exhibit deficits in multiple domains including joint attention, imitation, and emulation. In typical development, these key social skills hinge on monitoring the activities and actions of others. Our recent study demonstrated that 20-month old toddlers with ASD attend less to activities than both age-matched typically developing (TD) toddlers and age- and cognitively-matched developmentally delayed (DD) toddlers, focusing instead more on non-social background elements such as toys. Given the cascading deficits that may arise when children are deprived of a vital route by which to learn from others, there exists a pressing need to better understand the developmental mechanisms leading to both typical and atypical activity monitoring. This proposal seeks to understand why toddlers with ASD monitor the activities of others less frequently by examining the social, perceptual, and developmental factors which may influence this ability in 20-month old toddlers with ASD and 14- and 20-month old TD toddlers. In regards to typical development, this proposal aims to chart the normative developmental changes in activity monitoring and to understand the bases for these changes, thus providing a context by which to understand limited activity monitoring in ASD. In regards to ASD, this proposal seeks to quantify to what extent limited activity monitoring in ASD is due to (1) orienting less towards the locus of the shared attention of others; (2) being less sensitive to motion cues; and (3) being more easily distracted from social activities by perceptual distractors. To answer these questions we present subjects with scenes depicting play interactions between two actors and modulate the following factors: (1) whether the actors are focused on the centrally shared area or mutually upon each other; (2) whether the scene is shown as a static image or a dynamic movie; and (3) the extent to which the background is cluttered with distractors such as toys. To clarify the impact of these factors, we also examine the relationships between patterns of attention in experimental conditions and socio-cognitive functioning in ASD. Finally, we augment traditional analysis of variance analytic approach with computational modeling and dynamic analyses in order to better understand the microstructure of activity monitoring in ASD and TD toddlers. Disruptions in activity monitoring at an age where rapid development and skill acquisition is occurring in TD children may critically impact the social experience of children with ASD. By understanding the factors contributing to limited activity monitoring in ASD, and by charting the changes in activity monitoring occurring in typical development, we hope to gain insight into those specific processes which may be altered in ASD. This work thus has the potential to lead to novel measures of outcome, to aid in the development of new tools for parsing the heterogeneity of ASD, and to inform the design of targeted treatment for ASD in early development. PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: Typically developing children seem to learn effortlessly simply by watching other people engaged in activities; however, children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) show limited attention towards the activities of others, limiting their ability to learn. This project examines how limited activity monitoring in ASD is related to sensitivity to the gaze and focus of others, sensitivity to motion and dynamic cues, and distractibility caused by competitors to social attention. By understanding the components which may contribute to limited activity monitoring, and by understanding the trends in the typical development of activity monitoring, this project has the potential to aid in the development of novel methods for the early screening, monitoring, and treatment of ASD.