title: Preferential awareness of protofacial stimuli in autism.
abstract: It has been suggested that a subcortically mediated, innate sensitivity to protofacial stimuli leads to specialized face processing and to the development of the social brain. A dysfunction of this face-processing pathway has been associated with atypical social development in individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). This study investigated whether individuals with ASD exhibit primary sensitivity to monochrome protoface stimuli using continuous flash suppression (CFS). Under CFS, visual stimuli are suppressed from awareness, and cortical processing is strongly reduced while subcortical regions continue to respond to invisible stimuli. We found that both adolescents with ASD and typically developing adolescents showed preferential detection of upright protoface stimuli under CFS but not in a non-CFS control condition. These results challenge the notion that a primitive sensitivity to protoface stimuli is essential for typical social development. Rather, our findings suggest such sensitivity is not a sufficient condition for typical social development and that the presence of other complementary factors is necessary for the development of the social brain.
authors.affiliation: Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS), Tokyo, Japan; Department of Cognitive and Behavioral Science, University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan; Division of Information System Design, Tokyo Denki University, Saitama, Japan. Electronic address: akechi@cogn.jp.
authors.forename: Hironori
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Akechi
authors.affiliation: Center for Mind/Brain Sciences (CIMeC), University of Trento, Trento, Italy.
authors.forename: Timo
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Stein
authors.affiliation: Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS), Tokyo, Japan; College of Education, Ibaraki University, Ibaraki, Japan.
authors.forename: Yukiko
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Kikuchi
authors.affiliation: College of Education, Ibaraki University, Ibaraki, Japan.
authors.forename: Yoshikuni
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Tojo
authors.affiliation: Musashino Higashi Center for Education and Research, Musashino Higashi Gakuen, Tokyo, Japan.
authors.forename: Hiroo
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Osanai
authors.affiliation: Department of Cognitive and Behavioral Science, University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan.
authors.forename: Toshikazu
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Hasegawa
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D001321:Autistic Disorder / Q000503:physiopathology / Q000523:psychology*; D001364:Awareness / Q000502:physiology*; D001921:Brain / Q000503:physiopathology*; D002648:Child; D005145:Face; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual / Q000502:physiology*; D010775:Photic Stimulation; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Autism spectrum disorder; Conscious awareness; Protofacial stimuli; Social brain