title: Neural basis of self and other representation in autism: an FMRI study of self-face recognition.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Autism is a developmental disorder characterized by decreased interest and engagement in social interactions and by enhanced self-focus. While previous theoretical approaches to understanding autism have emphasized social impairments and altered interpersonal interactions, there is a recent shift towards understanding the nature of the representation of the self in individuals with autism spectrum disorders (ASD). Still, the neural mechanisms subserving self-representations in ASD are relatively unexplored.
  
  
  RESULTS
  We used event-related fMRI to investigate brain responsiveness to images of the subjects' own face and to faces of others. Children with ASD and typically developing (TD) children viewed randomly presented digital morphs between their own face and a gender-matched other face, and made "self/other" judgments. Both groups of children activated a right premotor/prefrontal system when identifying images containing a greater percentage of the self face. However, while TD children showed activation of this system during both self- and other-processing, children with ASD only recruited this system while viewing images containing mostly their own face.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  This functional dissociation between the representation of self versus others points to a potential neural substrate for the characteristic self-focus and decreased social understanding exhibited by these individuals, and suggests that individuals with ASD lack the shared neural representations for self and others that TD children and adults possess and may use to understand others.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, California, USA. lucina@stanford.edu
authors.forename: Lucina Q
authors.initials: LQ
authors.lastname: Uddin
authors.forename: Mari S
authors.initials: MS
authors.lastname: Davies
authors.forename: Ashley A
authors.initials: AA
authors.lastname: Scott
authors.forename: Eran
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Zaidel
authors.forename: Susan Y
authors.initials: SY
authors.lastname: Bookheimer
authors.forename: Marco
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Iacoboni
authors.forename: Mirella
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Dapretto
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D001321:Autistic Disorder / Q000503:physiopathology* / Q000523:psychology; D001519:Behavior / Q000502:physiology; D001931:Brain Mapping / Q000379:methods*; D002648:Child; D005145:Face; D005149:Facial Expression; D006801:Humans; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging / Q000379:methods*; D008297:Male; D008606:Mental Processes / Q000502:physiology; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual / Q000502:physiology*; D010775:Photic Stimulation; D012649:Self Concept; D012938:Social Perception