title: Brief Report: Suboptimal Auditory Localization in Autism Spectrum Disorder: Support for the Bayesian Account of Sensory Symptoms.
abstract: Convergent research suggests that people with ASD have difficulties localizing sounds in space. These difficulties have implications for communication, the development of social behavior, and quality of life. Recently, a theory has emerged which treats perceptual symptoms in ASD as the product of impairments in implicit Bayesian inference; as suboptimalities in the integration of sensory evidence with prior perceptual knowledge. We present the results of an experiment that applies this new theory to understanding difficulties in auditory localization, and we find that adults with ASD integrate prior information less optimally when making perceptual judgments about the spatial sources of sounds. We discuss these results in terms of their implications for formal models of symptoms in ASD.
authors.affiliation: Department of Culture and Society, Interacting Minds Centre, Aarhus University, Jens Chr. Skous Vej 4, Building 1.483, 3., 8000, Aarhus, Denmark. filjcs@cas.au.dk.|Centre of Functionally Integrative Neuroscience, Aarhus University Hospitals, Aarhus, Denmark. filjcs@cas.au.dk.
authors.forename: Joshua C
authors.initials: JC
authors.lastname: Skewes
authors.affiliation: Department of Culture and Society, Interacting Minds Centre, Aarhus University, Jens Chr. Skous Vej 4, Building 1.483, 3., 8000, Aarhus, Denmark.|Centre of Functionally Integrative Neuroscience, Aarhus University Hospitals, Aarhus, Denmark.|Department of Psychology and Behavioural Sciences, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark.
authors.forename: Line
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Gebauer
mesh_terms: D000161:Acoustic Stimulation / Q000379:methods* / Q000523:psychology*; D000328:Adult; D000067877:Autism Spectrum Disorder / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000523:psychology*; D001499:Bayes Theorem; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007600:Judgment / Q000502:physiology; D008297:Male; D011597:Psychomotor Performance / Q000502:physiology; D011788:Quality of Life / Q000523:psychology; D011930:Reaction Time / Q000502:physiology; D013017:Sound Localization / Q000502:physiology*
keywords: Auditory localization; Bayesian models; Sensory symptoms