Multisensory speech perception in children with autism spectrum disorders

Abstract

This study examined unisensory and multisensory speech perception in 8-17 year old children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) and typically developing controls matched on chronological age, sex, and IQ. Consonant-vowel syllables were presented in visual only, auditory only, matched audiovisual, and mismatched audiovisual ("McGurk") conditions. Participants with ASD displayed deficits in visual only and matched audiovisual speech perception. Additionally, children with ASD reported a visual influence on heard speech in response to mismatched audiovisual syllables over a wider window of time relative to controls. Correlational analyses revealed associations between multisensory speech perception, communicative characteristics, and responses to sensory stimuli in ASD. Results suggest atypical speech perception is linked to broader behavioral characteristics of ASD.

Fig. 1

Identification accuracy according to stimulus modality and diagnostic group. ASD autism spectrum disorders group, TD typically developing control group. This graph represents the mean identification accuracy of children with ASD (black bars) and TD controls (gray bars) across stimulus modalities. Error bars represent standard error of the mean (SEM). Children with ASD show significantly poorer performance in visual only and matched audiovisual conditions in comparison with TD peers

Fig. 2

Temporal binding of audiovisual speech according to diagnosis. ASD autism spectrum disorders group, TD typically developing control group. a Represents the raw values of reported fusion for children with ASD (black) and TD (gray) at each stimulus onset asynchrony. b Depicts the sigmoid curves for representative ASD and TD participants derived from normalized individual data. c Presents the mean temporal binding windows of children with ASD and TD estimated as the width of the stimulus offset range at which participants fused the visual “ga” and auditory “ba” stimulus pair on 75 % or more of the trials. Error bars represent SEM. Children with ASD integrate information over a marginally wider window of time than controls (p = .051). Note: There was not a significant difference in the mean percentage (i.e., magnitude) of fusions reported by children with ASD and TD controls at the 0 ms SOA

Fig. 3

Associations between multisensory speech perception and symptom severity. ADOS Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule (Lord et al. 2000). Multimodal identification accuracy is significantly correlated with ADOS Module 3 Communication score (r = −.578, p>.05; a), but not significantly associated with ADOS Module 3 Reciprocal Social Interaction score (r = −.291, p<.24; b) in participants with autism spectrum disorders

Fig. 4

Association between fusion of mismatched audiovisual information and sensory profile. SP Sensory Profile Caregiver Questionnaire. Percent reported fusion at 0 ms stimulus onset asynchrony significantly correlated with SP Auditory Processing score (r = .51, p>. 05; a) and the SP Inattention score (r = .61, p = .01; b) in participants with autism spectrum disorders