Can Neuroscience Detect Autism?
How Cognitive Neuroscience Could Be Used To Diagnose Autism
Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is characterised by impaired social communication skills and abnormal sensory-motor behaviours. According to the American Psychological Association, to diagnose ASD individuals must display persistant deficits in social communication and interaction, and exhibit repetitive behaviours and interests. Clinicians however, are often straped for time and do not have the capacity to diagnose individuals quickly and effectively, frequently not following DSM-5 reccommendations for diagnosis. This is where cognitive neuroscience may be able to help.
Sensory-Motor Deficits in ASD
One diagnostic criteria for ASD are sensory-motor deficts. These deficits are usually caused by an inability to intergrate perception and action. Researchers have demonstared this inability in studies involving tasks like reach to grasp tasks where participants had to move a small plastic cube from one location to another. In these tasks individuals with ASD performed significantly worse than typically developing children. Another grasping task involved researchers presenting food to children, while asking them to move it towards their mouth. They found children with ASD showed no neural activity in the muscle involved in…
