ABSTRACT
OBJECTIVE: Children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) and sensory processing dysfunction (SPD) are reported to show difficulties involving cognitive and visuomotor control. We sought to determine whether performance on computerized, behavioral measures of cognitive control aimed at assessing selective attention, as well as visuomotor abilities differentiated children with ASD (n = 14), SPD (n = 14) and typically developing controls (TDC; n = 28). METHOD: Cognitive control differences were measured by assessing selective attention-based abilities both with and without distracting stimuli, and visuomotor differences were measured by characterizing visuomotor tracking and tracing skills. Performance in cognitive control and visuomotor domains were investigated globally as composite scores, and specifically within each task. RESULTS: Our results indicated that though the ASD group showed the most impaired selective attention performance, the SPD group had intermediate abilities-performing above the ASD group but below the TDC group. Furthermore, both the SPD and ASD groups demonstrated equally impaired visuomotor abilities relative to the TDC group. A correlational analysis between cognitive and visuomotor control suggest a relationship between these overlapping control networks. CONCLUSIONS: This study supports the importance of direct, phenotypic characterizations of control-based abilities in children with ASD and SPD to personalize characterization and treatment interventions for at-risk children. (PsycINFO Database Record
Subject(s)
Autism Spectrum Disorder/psychology , Cognition , Psychomotor Performance , Sensation Disorders/psychology , Attention , Child , Discrimination, Psychological , Female , Humans , Male , Reaction TimeABSTRACT
Daily experiences demand both focused and broad allocation of attention for us to interact efficiently with our complex environments. Many types of attention have shown age-related decline, although there is also evidence that such deficits may be remediated with cognitive training. However, spatial attention abilities have shown inconsistent age-related differences, and the extent of potential enhancement of these abilities remains unknown. Here, we assessed spatial attention in both healthy younger and older adults and trained this ability in both age groups for 5 hr over the course of 2 weeks using a custom-made, computerized mobile training application. We compared training-related gains on a spatial attention assessment and spatial working memory task to age-matched controls who engaged in expectancy-matched, active placebo computerized training. Age-related declines in spatial attention abilities were observed regardless of task difficulty. Spatial attention training led to improved focused and distributed attention abilities as well as improved spatial working memory in both younger and older participants. No such improvements were observed in either of the age-matched control groups. Note that these findings were not a function of improvements in simple response time, as basic motoric function did not change after training. Furthermore, when using change in simple response time as a covariate, all findings remained significant. These results suggest that spatial attention training can lead to enhancements in spatial working memory regardless of age.
