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Ferris Wheels seem to fascinate film-directors – notably Carol Reed in The Third Man (1949), based on Graham Greene’s story and script. Though Ferris Wheels figure less conspicuously in twentieth-century novels, Malcolm Lowry provides an exception in Under the Volcano (1947), a novel also comparable to The Third Man in other ways. One explanation might be that Greene simply drew on Lowry’s example when developing his film-script (later published as a novella) – work begun very shortly after Under the Volcano had appeared. More plausibly, each writer might be understood to have responded separately, though similarly, to the unique pressures of their age. Identifying how these stresses were represented in their work, through cognate symbologies, may suggest some productive ways of reading historically.

Joseph Conrad’s fiction – Lord Jim especially – contains several instances of characters struggling with translation, or with foreign languages more generally, or transferring speech or syntactic patterns from one language to another. These features have much to suggest about Conrad’s own multilingual early life and his eventual adoption of English for his writing. They also have wider implications concerning his vision and tactics as a novelist – including his reliance on French fiction, and his regular emphases on cultural difference and on the cognitive and epistemological challenges of communicating experience. These challenges, in turn, initiate or anticipate concerns widely apparent in modernist fiction, indicating stresses in an advancing, globalised modernity which made its innovations so necessary. Appreciating Conrad’s interest in translation elucidates and confirms Fredric Jameson’s judgement of his writing as a key factor in the emergence of modernism in the early twentieth century.

Abstract Background Activation of the A2A adenosine receptor (A2AAR) decreases production of inflammatory cytokines, prevents C. difficile toxin A-induced enteritis and, in combination with antibiotics, increases survival from sepsis in mice. We investigated whether A2AAR activation improves and A2AAR deletion worsens outcomes in a murine model of C. difficile (strain VPI10463) infection (CDI). Methods C57BL/6 mice were pretreated with an antibiotic cocktail prior to infection and then treated with vancomycin with or without an A2AAR agonist. A2AAR-/- and littermate wild-type (WT) mice were similarly infected, and IFNγ and TNFα were measured at peak of and recovery from infection. Results Infected, untreated mice rapidly lost weight, developed diarrhea, and had mortality rates of 50-60%. Infected mice treated with vancomycin had less weight loss and diarrhea during antibiotic treatment but mortality increased to near 100% after discontinuation of antibiotics. Infected mice treated with both vancomycin and an A2AAR agonist, either ATL370 or ATL1222, had minimal weight loss and better long-term survival than mice treated with vancomycin alone. A2AAR KO mice were more susceptible than WT mice to death from CDI. Increases in cecal IFNγ and blood TNFα were pronounced in the absence of A2AARs. Conclusion In a murine model of CDI, vancomycin treatment resulted in reduced weight loss and diarrhea during acute infection, but high recurrence and late-onset death, with overall mortality being worse than untreated infected controls. The administration of vancomycin plus an A2AAR agonist reduced inflammation and improved survival rates, suggesting a possible benefit of A2AAR agonists in the management of CDI to prevent recurrent disease.

Objectives: Speech intelligibility is supported by the sound of a talker's voice and visual cues related to articulatory movements. The relative contribution of auditory and visual cues to an integrated audiovisual percept varies depending on a listener's environment and sensory acuity. Cochlear implant users rely more on visual cues than those with acoustic hearing to help compensate for the fact that the auditory signal produced by their implant is poorly resolved relative to that of the typically developed cochlea. The relative weight placed on auditory and visual speech cues can be measured by presenting discordant cues across the two modalities and assessing the resulting percept (the McGurk effect). The current literature is mixed with regards to how cochlear implant users respond to McGurk stimuli; some studies suggest they report hearing syllables that represent a fusion of the auditory and visual cues more frequently than typical hearing controls while others report less frequent fusion. However, several of these studies compared implant users to younger control samples despite evidence that the likelihood and strength of audiovisual integration increase with age. Thus, the present study sought to clarify the impacts of hearing status and age on multisensory speech integration using a combination of behavioral analyses and response modeling., Design: Cochlear implant users (mean age = 58.9 years), age-matched controls (mean age = 61.5 years), and younger controls (mean age = 25.9 years) completed an online audiovisual speech task. Participants were shown and/or heard four different talkers producing syllables in auditory-alone, visual-alone, and incongruent audiovisual conditions. After each trial, participants reported the syllable they heard or saw from a list of four possible options., Results: The younger and older control groups performed similarly in both unisensory conditions. The cochlear implant users performed significantly better than either control group in the visual-alone condition. When responding to the incongruent audiovisual trials, cochlear implant users and age-matched controls experienced significantly more fusion than younger controls. When fusion was not experienced, younger controls were more likely to report the auditorily presented syllable than either implant users or age-matched controls. Conversely, implant users were more likely to report the visually presented syllable than either age-matched controls or younger controls. Modeling of the relationship between stimuli and behavioral responses revealed that younger controls had lower disparity thresholds (i.e., were less likely to experience a fused audiovisual percept) than either the implant users or older controls, while implant users had higher levels of sensory noise (i.e., more variability in the way a given stimulus pair is perceived across multiple presentations) than age-matched controls., Conclusions: Our findings suggest that age and cochlear implantation may have independent effects on McGurk effect perception. Noisy encoding of disparity modeling confirms that age is a strong predictor of an individual's prior likelihood of experiencing audiovisual integration but suggests that hearing status modulates this relationship due to differences in sensory noise during speech encoding. Together, these findings demonstrate that different groups of listeners can arrive at similar levels of performance in different ways, and highlight the need for careful consideration of stimulus- and group-related effects on multisensory speech perception., Competing Interests: The authors have no conflicts of interest to disclose., (Copyright © 2024 The American Auditory Society.)

Older adults experience a greater benefit from multisensory integration than their younger counterparts, but it is unclear why. One hypothesis is that age-related sensory decline weakens unisensory stimulus effectiveness, causing a boost in multisensory gain through inverse effectiveness. Many previous studies present stimuli at the same intensity for both younger and older adults (i.e., stimulus-matched), as opposed to accounting for each participant's unique perceptual ability (i.e., perception-matched). This makes it difficult to discern the source of age-related differences in multisensory gain. As such, we used two experiments to examine whether sensory decline is contributing to age-related differences in multisensory gain. In the first, we presented auditory (pure tones in noise), visual (Gabor patches in noise), and audiovisual stimuli and recorded response times from 31 younger (18-25) and 30 older (55-80) adults. Importantly, all participants were given identical stimuli, with the expectation that older adults would show worse unisensory performance, inducing inverse effectiveness. The second task was identical (younger N = 31, older N = 34), except stimuli were presented at each participant's 50% detection threshold, identified with an adaptive psychophysical staircase, controlling for any influence of inverse effectiveness. Older adults were found to exhibit greater multisensory gain (as measured by race model violations) on stimulus- but not perception-matched tasks, thus aligning with the principle of inverse effectiveness. That is, when accounting for potential age-related differences in perceptual abilities, older adults no longer experienced greater benefit from multisensory integration. These two experiments together suggest that the age-related increases in multisensory integration previously reported may be in part due to age-related declines in vision and audition. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Objectives: Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is the most common neurodevelopmental condition and is characterized by inattention, hyperactivity, and impulsivity. Research suggests that some populations, such as females and individuals with high intelligence quotients may be a risk for late ADHD diagnosis and subsequent treatment. Our goal is to advance our understanding of ADHD diagnosis, by examining (1) how child sex and cognitive abilities together are related to the age of diagnosis and (2) whether symptom presentation, current internalizing and externalizing symptoms, and demographic factors are related to age of diagnosis., Methods: Our analyses contained children who completed the required tests (N = 568) from a pre-existing dataset of 1380 children with ADHD from the Province of Ontario Neurodevelopmental Disorders (POND) Network (pond-network.ca). First, we conducted a moderation analysis with sex as the predictor, cognitive abilities as the moderator, and age of diagnosis as the outcome. Second, we conducted correlation analyses examining how symptom presentation, current internalizing and externalizing symptoms, and demographic factors are related to age of diagnosis., Results: Higher IQ was related to a later age of diagnosis. Higher hyperactive-impulsive symptoms and externalizing symptoms were related to an earlier age of diagnosis. Internalizing symptoms were trend associated with a later age of diagnosis in girls. Higher socioeconomic status and non-White maternal ethnicity were related to later age of diagnosis., Conclusions: IQ, sex, ADHD symptomology, internalizing symptoms, externalizing symptoms, and socio-demographic factors affect the age of diagnosis., (© 2024 The Author(s). British Journal of Clinical Psychology published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of British Psychological Society.)

Face-to-face speech communication is an audiovisual process during which the interlocuters use both the auditory speech signals as well as visual, oral articulations to understand the other. These sensory inputs are merged into a single, unified process known as multisensory integration. Audiovisual speech integration is known to be influenced by many factors, including listener experience. In this study, we investigated the roles of bilingualism and language experience on integration. We used a McGurk paradigm in which participants were presented with incongruent auditory and visual speech. This included an auditory utterance of 'ba' paired with visual articulations of 'ga' that often induce the perception of 'da' or 'tha', a fusion effect that is strong evidence of integration, as well as an auditory utterance of 'ga' paired with visual articulations of 'ba' that often induce the perception of 'bga', a combination effect that is weaker evidence of integration. We compared fusion and combination effects on three groups ( N = 20 each), English monolinguals, Spanish-English bilinguals, and Arabic-English bilinguals, with stimuli presented in all three languages. Monolinguals exhibited significantly stronger multisensory integration than bilinguals in fusion effects, regardless of the stimulus language. Bilinguals exhibited a nonsignificant trend by which greater experience led to increased integration as measured by fusion. These results held regardless of whether McGurk presentations were presented as stand-alone syllables or in the context of real words.

The structure of event knowledge plays a critical role in prediction, reconstruction of memory for personal events, construction of possible future events, action, language usage, and social interactions. Despite numerous theoretical proposals such as scripts, schemas, and stories, the highly variable and rich nature of events and event knowledge have been formidable barriers to characterizing the structure of event knowledge in memory. We used network science to provide insights into the temporal structure of common events. Based on participants' production and ordering of the activities that make up events, we established empirical profiles for 80 common events to characterize the temporal structure of activities. We used the event networks to investigate multiple issues regarding the variability in the richness and complexity of people's knowledge of common events, including: the temporal structure of events; event prototypes that might emerge from learning across many experiential instances and be expressed by people; the degree to which scenes (communities) are present in various events; the degree to which people believe certain activities are central to an event; how centrality might be distributed across an event's activities; and similarities among events in terms of their content and their temporal structure. Thus, we provide novel insights into human event knowledge, and describe 18 predictions for future human studies., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest None. No AI and AI-assisted technologies were used in the writing process., (Copyright © 2024 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Youth diagnosed with Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) often show deficits in various measures of higher-level cognition, such as, executive functioning. Poorer cognitive functioning in children with ADHD has been associated with differences in functional connectivity across the brain. However, little is known about the developmental changes to the brain's functional properties linked to different cognitive abilities in this cohort. To characterize these changes, we analyzed fMRI data (ADHD = 373, NT = 106) collected while youth between the ages of 6 and 16 watched a short movie-clip. We applied machine learning models to identify patterns of network connectivity in response to movie-watching that differentially predict cognitive abilities in our cohort. Using out-of-sample cross validation, our models successfully predicted IQ, visual spatial, verbal comprehension, and fluid reasoning in children (ages 6 - 11), but not in adolescents with ADHD (ages 12-16). Connections with the default mode, memory retrieval, and dorsal attention were driving prediction during early and middle childhood, but connections with the somatomotor, cingulo-opercular, and frontoparietal networks were more important in middle childhood. This work demonstrated that machine learning approaches can identify distinct functional connectivity profiles associated with cognitive abilities at different developmental stages in children and adolescents with ADHD., Competing Interests: Declaration of Competing Interest The authors declare the following financial interests/personal relationships which may be considered as potential competing interests Bobby Stojanoski reports financial support was provided by Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada. If there are other authors, they declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2024 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.. All rights reserved.)

Research has indicated that second-language learners have difficulty producing geminates accurately. Previous studies have also shown an effect of orthography on second-language speech production. We tested whether the existence of a contrast in the first language phonology for length aids the second-language production of the same contrast. Furthermore, we examined the effect of exposure to orthographic input on geminate consonant production in a cross-script context. We tested the production of Arabic geminate-singleton stop consonants [/bː/-/b/, /tː/-/t/, /dː/-/d/, and /kː/-/k/], a nasal stop consonant /mː/-/m/, and an emphatic stop consonant /tˤː/-/tˤ/, as well as the effect of the diacritic used in Arabic to mark gemination in a delayed imitation task and two reading tasks (ortho-with diacritics and ortho-without diacritics). A comparison of the productions of advanced Japanese-speaking learners, English-speaking learners, and an Arabic control group showed that both learner groups were able to produce Arabic geminate stops; however, the Japanese-speaking learners exhibited an advantage over the English-speaking learners in the auditory-only task and in the presence of diacritics, highlighting the fact that orthographic effects may occur in some cross-script contexts.

Background: Impairing repetitive behaviors are one of the core diagnostic symptoms in autism spectrum disorder and obsessive-compulsive disorder, but they also manifest in attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder. Although the dorsal striatal circuit has been implicated in repetitive behaviors, extensive heterogeneity in and cross-diagnostic manifestations of these behaviors have suggested phenotypic and likely neurobiological heterogeneity across neurodevelopmental disorders (NDDs)., Methods: Intrinsic dorsal striatal functional connectivity was examined in 3 NDDs (autism spectrum disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder) and typically developing control participants in a large single-cohort sample (N = 412). To learn how diagnostic labels and overlapping behaviors manifest in dorsal striatal functional connectivity measured with functional magnetic resonance imaging, the main and interaction effects of diagnosis and behavior were examined in 8 models (2 seed functional connectivity [caudate and putamen] × 4 sub-behavioral domains [sameness/ritualistic, self-injury, stereotypy, and compulsions])., Results: The obsessive-compulsive disorder group demonstrated distinctive patterns in visual and visuomotor coordination regions compared with the other diagnostic groups. Lower-order repetitive behaviors (self-injury and stereotypy) manifesting across all participants were implicated in regions involved in motor and cognitive control, although the findings did not survive effects of multiple comparisons, suggesting heterogeneity in these behavioral domains. An interaction between self-injurious behavior and an attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder diagnosis were observed on caudate-cerebellum functional connectivity., Conclusions: These findings confirmed high heterogeneity and overlapping behavioral manifestations in NDDs and their complex underlying neural mechanisms. A call for diagnosis-free symptom measures that can capture not only observable symptoms and severity across NDDs but also the underlying functions and motivations of such behaviors across diagnoses is needed., (Copyright © 2024. Published by Elsevier Inc.)

Background: Travellers' Diarrhoea (TD) continues to be the most common travel-related medical event in international travellers. Updated incidence and risk factor data will improve pre-travel medical advice for travellers from high-income countries (HIC), providing an opportunity for disease prevention, and appropriate disease management., Methods: A systematic search for cohort studies of TD incidence published between 1 January 1997 and 2 March 2023 was performed using Ovid Medline, SCOPUS, and Google Scholar databases. Study quality was assessed with a modified Newcastle-Ottawa scale (NOS). We extracted incidence data for adults travelling less than 100 days from HIC and available risk factor data. The overall random-effects pooled incidence and the corresponding 95% confidence intervals (95% CI) were estimated. Heterogeneity was assessed using the I2 statistic, tau and the 95% prediction intervals. Subgroup analyses were conducted to identify sources of heterogeneity. Risk factor studies were reviewed qualitatively and described., Results: Ten studies were included in the meta-analysis, containing 8478 participants. Two of the studies measured as high quality and eight as good quality as assessed by the modified NOS. The TD incidence was 36.1% (95% CI 24-41%; I2 94%), with a prediction interval ranging from 20.3% to 55.8%. The pooled incidence of mild, moderate, and severe TD was 23.6%, 8.1% and 2.9%, respectively. Subgroup analysis showed that the incidence increased with increasing average data collection period. Risk factors for TD in travellers from HIC identified include younger age, longer travel periods, low and middle-income destinations, travelling for tourism, backpacking travel styles and pre-travel health status., Conclusion: It is estimated that between 20 to 56% of international travellers can expect to develop TD in travel of under 100 days. While most cases are mild, approximately 3% of all travellers will experience a disease that prevents usual activities or requires medical attention., (© The Author(s) 2024. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of International Societyof Travel Medicine.)

Sensory processing abilities are highly variable within and across people diagnosed with autism and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). This study examined the transdiagnostic nature of sensory processing abilities, and their association with features of autism and ADHD, in a large sample of autistic people (n = 495) and people with ADHD (n = 461). Five similar data-driven sensory phenotypes characterized sensory processing abilities, and showed similar patterns of association with features of autism and ADHD, across both diagnostic groups. These results demonstrate the transdiagnostic nature of sensory processing abilities, while contributing to a growing body of literature that suggests the autism and ADHD diagnostic labels have poor explanatory power., (© 2022. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature.)

This review aimed to explore the current understanding of sensory gating in neurodevelopmental disorders as a possible transdiagnostic mechanism. We applied methods according to the Joanna Briggs Institute Manual for Evidence Synthesis, following the population, concept, and context scoping review eligibility criteria. Using a comprehensive search strategy in five relevant research databases (Medline, EMBASE, CINAHL, PsychInfo, and Scopus), we searched for relevant peer-reviewed, primary research articles and unpublished data. Two independent reviewers screened the titles and abstracts, full-texts, and completed data extraction. We identified a total of 81 relevant articles and used descriptive analyses to summarize the characteristics and outcomes of all identified studies. Literature regarding sensory gating was most common in autistic populations with relatively fewer studies examining attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, tic disorders, and childhood-onset fluency disorder (COFD). The methods to assess sensory gating varied widely both within and between groups and included measures such as habituation, prepulse inhibition, affect-modulated inhibition, medication and other intervention trials. Most consistently, when participants complete questionnaires about their sensory experiences, those who have neurodevelopmental disorders report differences in their sensory gating. Affect-modulated inhibition appears to be discrepant between samples with and without neurodevelopmental disorder diagnoses. Habituation was the most commonly reported phenomenon and many differences in habituation have been found in autistic individuals and individuals with tic disorders whereas concerns with inhibition seemed more common in COFD. Overall, the evidence is inconsistent within and between disorders suggesting there is still much to learn about sensory gating in neurodevelopmental disorders., (© 2023. Crown.)

The reduction in spectral resolution by cochlear implants oftentimes requires complementary visual speech cues to facilitate understanding. Despite substantial clinical characterization of auditory-only speech measures, relatively little is known about the audiovisual (AV) integrative abilities that most cochlear implant (CI) users rely on for daily speech comprehension. In this study, we tested AV integration in 63 CI users and 69 normal-hearing (NH) controls using the McGurk and sound-induced flash illusions. To our knowledge, this study is the largest to-date measuring the McGurk effect in this population and the first that tests the sound-induced flash illusion (SIFI). When presented with conflicting AV speech stimuli (i.e., the phoneme "ba" dubbed onto the viseme "ga"), we found that 55 CI users (87%) reported a fused percept of "da" or "tha" on at least one trial. After applying an error correction based on unisensory responses, we found that among those susceptible to the illusion, CI users experienced lower fusion than controls-a result that was concordant with results from the SIFI where the pairing of a single circle flashing on the screen with multiple beeps resulted in fewer illusory flashes for CI users. While illusion perception in these two tasks appears to be uncorrelated among CI users, we identified a negative correlation in the NH group. Because neither illusion appears to provide further explanation of variability in CI outcome measures, further research is needed to determine how these findings relate to CI users' speech understanding, particularly in ecological listening conditions that are naturally multisensory.

Event knowledge, a person's understanding of patterns of activities in the world, is crucial for everyday social interactions. Social communication differences are prominent in autism, which may be related to atypical event knowledge, such as atypical knowledge of the sequences of activities that comprise the temporal structure of events. Previous research has found that autistic individuals have atypical event knowledge, but research in this area is minimal, particularly regarding autistic individuals' knowledge of the temporal structure of events. Furthermore, no studies have investigated the link between event knowledge and autistic traits in a non-clinical sample. We investigated relationships between event knowledge and autistic traits in individuals from the general population with varying degrees of autistic traits. We predicted that atypical ordering of event activities is related to autistic traits, particularly social communication abilities, but not other clinical traits. In Study 1, atypical ordering of event activities correlated with social ability, but not with most measures of repetitive behaviours and restricted interests. In Study 2, the typicality of activity ordering varied by participants' social ability and the social nature of the events. Relationships were not found between event activity ordering and other clinical traits. These findings suggest a relationship between autistic traits, specifically social abilities, and knowledge of the temporal structure of events in a general population sample., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest All authors declare no conflicts of interest., (Copyright © 2022 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Integrating sensory information from multiple modalities leads to more precise and efficient perception and behaviour. The process of determining which sensory information should be perceptually bound is reliant on both low-level stimulus features, as well as multisensory associations learned throughout development based on the statistics of our environment. Here, we explored the relationship between multisensory associative learning and multisensory integration using encephalography (EEG) and behavioural measures. Sixty-one participants completed a three-phase study. First, participants were exposed to novel audiovisual shape-tone pairings with frequent and infrequent stimulus pairings and completed a target detection task. EEG recordings of the mismatch negativity (MMN) and P3 were calculated as neural indices of multisensory associative learning. Next, the same learned stimulus pairs were presented in audiovisual as well as unisensory auditory and visual modalities while both early (<100 ms) and late neural indices of multisensory integration were recorded. Finally, participants completed an analogous behavioural speeded-response task, with behavioural indices of multisensory gain calculated using the Race Model. Significant relationships were found in fronto-central and occipital areas between neural measures of associative learning and both early and late indices of multisensory integration in frontal and centro-parietal areas, respectively. Participants who showed stronger indices of associative learning also exhibited stronger indices of multisensory integration of the stimuli they learned to associate. Furthermore, a significant relationship was found between neural index of early multisensory integration and behavioural indices of multisensory gain. These results provide insight into the neural underpinnings of how higher-order processes such as associative learning guide multisensory integration., (Crown Copyright © 2022. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Sensory issues are highly prevalent in autism and previous findings support a relationship between questionnaires of sensitivity and autistic symptoms and traits, whereas studies that examine this relationship through behavioural assessments of sensitivity are less consistent. The current study explores these differences and suggests that behavioural thresholds for sensitivity and subjective sensitivity are distinct constructs. One hundred and eighteen adults completed a visual and auditory detection task and questionnaires on sensory processing and autistic traits. Visual thresholds and subjective visual sensitivity were not correlated, but both were related to autistic traits. Auditory thresholds and subjective auditory sensitivity were also unrelated. Overall, sensitivity is highly associated with autistic traits, however, behavioural and questionnaire assessments lack convergent validity and therefore, likely assess distinct constructs., (© 2021. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature.)

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder that affects one in 66 children in Canada. The contributions of changes in the cortex and cerebellum to autism have been studied for decades. However, our understanding of brainstem contributions has only started to emerge more recently. Disruptions of sensory processing, startle response, sensory filtering, sensorimotor gating, multisensory integration and sleep are all features of ASD and are processes in which the brainstem is involved. In addition, preliminary research into brainstem contribution emphasizes the importance of the developmental timeline rather than just the mature brainstem. Therefore, the purpose of this systematic review is to compile histological, behavioral, neuroimaging, and electrophysiological evidence from human and animal studies about brainstem contributions and their functional implications in autism. Moreover, due to the developmental nature of autism, the review pays attention to the atypical brainstem development and compares findings based on age. Overall, there is evidence of an important role of brainstem disruptions in ASD, but there is still the need to examine the brainstem across the life span, from infancy to adulthood which could lead the way for early diagnosis and possibly treatment of ASD., Competing Interests: The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2021 Seif, Shea, Schmid and Stevenson.)

Background: Atypical reactions to the sensory environment are often reported in autistic individuals, with a high degree of variability across the sensory modalities. These sensory differences have been shown to promote challenging behaviours and distress in autistic individuals and are predictive of other functions including motor, social, and cognitive abilities. Preliminary research suggests that specific sensory differences may cluster together within individuals creating discrete sensory phenotypes. However, the manner in which these sensory differences cluster, and whether the resulting phenotypes are associated with specific cognitive and social challenges is unclear., Methods: Short sensory profile data from 599 autistic children and adults between the ages of 1 and 21 years were subjected to a K-means cluster analysis. Analysis of variances compared age, adaptive behaviour, and traits associated with autism, attention-deficit and hyperactivity disorder, and obsessive and compulsive disorder across the resultant clusters., Results: A five-cluster model was found to minimize error variance and produce five sensory phenotypes: (1) sensory adaptive, (2) generalized sensory differences, (3) taste and smell sensitivity, (4) under-responsive and sensation seeking, and (5) movement difficulties with low energy. Age, adaptive behaviour, and traits associated with autism, attention-deficit and hyperactivity disorder, and obsessive and compulsive disorder were found to differ significantly across the five phenotypes., Limitations: The results were based on parent-report measures of sensory processing, adaptive behaviour, traits associated with autism, attention-deficit and hyperactivity disorder, and obsessive and compulsive disorder, which may limit the generalizability of the findings. Further, not all measures are standardized, or psychometrically validated with an autism population. Autistic individuals with an intellectual disability were underrepresented in this sample. Further, as these data were obtained from established records from a large provincial database, not all measures were completed for all individuals., Conclusions: These findings suggest that sensory difficulties in autistic individuals can be clustered into sensory phenotypes, and that these phenotypes are associated with behavioural differences. Given the large degree of heterogeneity in sensory difficulties seen in the autistic population, these sensory phenotypes represent an effective way to parse that heterogeneity and create phenotypes that may aid in the development of effective treatments and interventions for sensory difficulties., (© 2021. The Author(s).)

Restricted interests and repetitive behaviors (RRBs) are core symptoms of autism spectrum disorder (ASD), and commonly occur in attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Little is known about how RRBs manifest in ADHD. We quantified and compared factor structures of RRBs in children with ASD (n = 634) or ADHD (n = 448), and related factors to sex and IQ. A four-factor solution emerged, including Stereotypy, Self-Injury, Compulsions, and Ritualistic/Sameness. Factor structures were equivalent across diagnoses, though symptoms were more severe in ASD. IQ negatively correlated with Stereotypy, Self-Injury, and Compulsions in ASD, and negatively correlated with Compulsions and Ritualistic/Sameness behaviors in ADHD. In ASD only, females exhibited higher Self-Injury. Thus, patterns of RRBs are preserved across ASD and ADHD, but severity and relationship with IQ differed., (© 2020. Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature.)

Objective: Early identification of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is an essential healthcare priority. Girls may be at risk for late diagnosis, although research is equivocal regarding how sex and other factors relate to ASD identification. The goals of the current investigation were to (1) identify how child sex, cognitive abilities, and demographic factors relate to age of first concern (AOC) and age of diagnosis (AOD), (2) evaluate trends in AOC/AOD over time, and (3) consider whether main effects of sex on AOC/AOD are moderated by cognitive abilities or time., Method: Children (N = 365; 20% female; 85.6% identified as White) with ASD participated through the Province of Ontario Neurodevelopmental Disorders (POND) Network. Study records included AOD, date/timing of diagnosis (between 1996 and 2017), age of first parent concern, demographics, and standardized cognitive testing results (24.7% of children had IQ scores below standard scores of 70)., Results: Average AOC occurred before 2 years of age whereas average AOD occurred after 5 years of age. Girls did not differ on AOC but had a later AOD than boys. Higher verbal IQ was associated with later AOD more strongly in girls than boys. Regarding time-related changes, average AOC and AOD increased across the study period, more strongly for girls., Conclusions: Results support that sex is a key factor underlying delays in ASD identification and highlight the urgent need to improve diagnostic practices among girls. Limitations and implications for improving the diagnostic process are discussed., Abbreviations: ASD=autism spectrum disorder; IQ=intelligence quotient; AOC=parental report of age of first concern; AOD=age of diagnosis.

The study of sensory phenotypes has great potential for increasing research translation between species, a necessity to decipher the neural mechanisms that contribute to higher-order differences in neurological conditions such as autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Over the past decade, despite separate advances in our understanding of the structural and functional differences within the brain of autistic and non-autistic individuals and in rodent models for ASD, researchers have had difficulty translating the findings in murine species to humans, mostly due to incompatibility in experimental methodologies used to screen for ASD phenotypes. Focusing on sensory phenotypes offers an avenue to close the species gap because sensory pathways are highly conserved across species and are affected by the same risk-factors as the higher-order brain areas mostly responsible for the diagnostic criteria for ASD. By first reviewing how sensory processing has been studied to date, we direct our focus to electrophysiological and behavioral techniques that can be used to study sensory phenotypes consistently across species. Using auditory sensory phenotypes as a template, we seek to improve the accessibility of translational methods by providing a framework for collecting cohesive data in both rodents and humans. Specifically, evoked-potentials, acoustic startle paradigms, and psychophysical detection/discrimination paradigms can be created and implemented in a coordinated and systematic fashion across species. Through careful protocol design and collaboration, sensory processing phenotypes can be harnessed to bridge the gap that exists between preclinical animal studies and human testing, so that mutually held questions in autism research can be answered. LAY SUMMARY: It has always been difficult to relate results from animal research to humans. We try to close this gap by studying changes in sensory processing using careful protocol design and collaboration between clinicians and researchers. Sensory pathways are comparable between animals and humans, and are affected in the same way as the rest of the brain in ASD. Using changes in hearing as a template, we point the field in an innovative direction by providing a framework for collecting cohesive data in rodents and humans., (© 2021 International Society for Autism Research and Wiley Periodicals LLC.)

Multisensory integration, the process by which sensory information from different sensory modalities are bound together, is hypothesized to contribute to perceptual symptomatology in schizophrenia, in whom multisensory integration differences have been consistently found. Evidence is emerging that these differences extend across the schizophrenia spectrum, including individuals in the general population with higher levels of schizotypal traits. In the current study, we used the McGurk task as a measure of multisensory integration. We measured schizotypal traits using the Schizotypal Personality Questionnaire (SPQ), hypothesizing that higher levels of schizotypal traits, specifically Unusual Perceptual Experiences and Odd Speech subscales, would be associated with decreased multisensory integration of speech. Surprisingly, Unusual Perceptual Experiences were not associated with multisensory integration. However, Odd Speech was associated with multisensory integration, and this association extended more broadly across the Disorganized factor of the SPQ, including Odd or Eccentric Behaviour. Individuals with higher levels of Odd or Eccentric Behaviour scores also demonstrated poorer lip-reading abilities, which partially explained performance in the McGurk task. This suggests that aberrant perceptual processes affecting individuals across the schizophrenia spectrum may relate to disorganized symptomatology., (Copyright © 2021 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Aims: The aim of this study was to determine the extent to which patient demographics, clinical presentation, and blood parameters vary in Kingella kingae septic arthritis when compared with those of other organisms, and whether this difference needs to be considered when assessing children in whom a diagnosis of septic arthritis is suspected., Methods: A prospective case series was undertaken at a single UK paediatric institution between October 2012 and November 2018 of all patients referred with suspected septic arthritis. We recorded the clinical, biochemical, and microbiological findings in all patients., Results: A total of 160 patients underwent arthrotomy for a presumed septic arthritis. Of these, no organism was identified in 61 and only 25 of these were both culture- and polymerase chain reaction (PCR)-negative. A total of 36 patients did not undergo PCR analysis. Of the remaining 99 culture- and PCR-positive patients, K. kingae was the most commonly isolated organism (42%, n = 42). The knee (n = 21), shoulder (n = 9), and hip (n = 5) were the three most commonly affected joints. A total of 28 cases (66%) of K. kingae infection were detected only on PCR. The mean age of K. kingae- positive cases (16.1 months) was significantly lower than that of those whose septic arthitis was due to other organisms (49.4 months; p < 0.001). The mean CRP was significantly lower in the K. kingae group than in the other organism group (p < 0.001). The mean ESR/CRP ratio was significantly higher in K. kingae (2.84) than in other infections (1.55; p < 0.008). The mean ESR and ESR/CRP were not significantly different from those in the 'no organism identified' group., Conclusion: K. kingae was the most commonly isolated organism from paediatric culture- and/or PCR-positive confirmed septic arthritis, with only one third of cases detected on routine cultures. It is important to develop and maintain a clinical suspicion for K. kingae infection in young patients presenting atypically. Routine PCR testing is recommended in these patients. Cite this article: Bone Joint J  2021;103-B(3):584-588.

While atypical sensory processing is one of the more ubiquitous symptoms in autism spectrum disorder, the exact nature of these sensory issues remains unclear, with different studies showing either enhanced or deficient sensory processing. Using a well-established continuous cued-recall task that assesses visual working memory, the current study provides novel evidence reconciling these apparently discrepant findings. Autistic children exhibited perceptual advantages in both likelihood of recall and recall precision relative to their typically-developed peers. When autistic children did make errors, however, they showed a higher probability of erroneously binding a given colour with the incorrect spatial location. These data align with neural-architecture models for feature binding in visual working memory, suggesting that atypical population-level neural noise in the report dimension (colour) and cue dimension (spatial location) may drive both the increase in probability of recall and precision of colour recall as well as the increase in proportion of binding errors when making an error, respectively. These changes are likely to impact core symptomatology associated with autism, as perceptual binding and working memory play significant roles in higher-order tasks, such as communication.

Recent literature has suggested that deficits in sensory processing are associated with schizophrenia (SCZ), and more specifically hallucination severity. The DSM-5's shift towards a dimensional approach to diagnostic criteria has led to SCZ and schizotypal personality disorder (SPD) being classified as schizophrenia spectrum disorders. With SCZ and SPD overlapping in aetiology and symptomatology, such as sensory abnormalities, it is important to investigate whether these deficits commonly reported in SCZ extend to non-clinical expressions of SPD. In this study, we investigated whether levels of SPD traits were related to audiovisual multisensory temporal processing in a non-clinical sample, revealing two novel findings. First, less precise multisensory temporal processing was related to higher overall levels of SPD symptomatology. Second, this relationship was specific to the cognitive-perceptual domain of SPD symptomatology, and more specifically, the Unusual Perceptual Experiences and Odd Beliefs or Magical Thinking symptomatology. The current study provides an initial look at the relationship between multisensory temporal processing and schizotypal traits. Additionally, it builds on the previous literature by suggesting that less precise multisensory temporal processing is not exclusive to SCZ but may also be related to non-clinical expressions of schizotypal traits in the general population.

The current study parsed out the distinct components of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) symptomatology to examine differential relations with language and social ability. Using a research domain criteria (RDoC) framework, we administered standardized tests and previously developed and validated questionnaires to assess levels of inattention and/or hyperactivity/impulsivity symptomatology, language, social responsivity and social competency in 98 young adults. Those with higher inattention and/or hyperactivity/impulsivity symptomatology had reduced language comprehension, social responsivity, and social competency. Inattention and hyperactivity/impulsivity both predicted language comprehension, but not language production. Interestingly, inattention uniquely contributed to social responsiveness and social competency, but hyperactivity/impulsivity did not. Findings suggest that inattention and/or hyperactivity/impulsivity symptoms, inattention in particular, may be especially important for social skills programs geared towards individuals with attention limitations., (Copyright © 2020 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Multisensory integration, the binding of sensory information from different sensory modalities, may contribute to perceptual symptomatology in schizophrenia, including hallucinations and aberrant speech perception. Differences in multisensory integration and temporal processing, an important component of multisensory integration, are consistently found in schizophrenia. Evidence is emerging that these differences extend across the schizophrenia spectrum, including individuals in the general population with higher schizotypal traits. In the current study, we investigated the relationship between schizotypal traits and perceptual functioning, using audiovisual speech-in-noise, McGurk, and ternary synchrony judgment tasks. We measured schizotypal traits using the Schizotypal Personality Questionnaire (SPQ), hypothesizing that higher scores on Unusual Perceptual Experiences and Odd Speech subscales would be associated with decreased multisensory integration, increased susceptibility to distracting auditory speech, and less precise temporal processing. Surprisingly, these measures were not associated with the predicted subscales, suggesting that these perceptual differences may not be present across the schizophrenia spectrum., (Copyright © 2020 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Autism spectrum disorder is a neurodevelopmental disorder that is characterized by impairments in social communication, restricted interests, and repetitive behaviors. Many studies have demonstrated atypical responses to audiovisual sensory inputs, particularly those containing sociolinguistic information. It is currently unclear whether these atypical responses are due to the linguistic nature of the inputs or the social aspect itself. Further, it is unclear how atypical sensory responses to sociocommunicative stimuli intersect with autism symptomatology. The current study addressed these outstanding questions by using pupillometry in mental age-matched children with and without autism (N = 71) to examine physiological responses to dynamic, audiovisual stimuli including social, sociolinguistic, socioemotional, and nonsocial stimuli, as well as to temporally manipulated stimuli. Data revealed group differences in pupillary responses with social stimuli but not nonsocial stimuli and, importantly, showed no variation through the inclusion of linguistic or emotional information. This suggests that atypical sensory responses are driven primarily by the inclusion of social information broadly. Further, individual responses to social stimuli were significantly correlated with a wide range of autism spectrum disorder symptomatology, including social communication, restricted interests and repetitive behaviors, and sensory processing issues. Pupillary responses to social but not nonsocial presentation were also capable of predicting diagnosis with a high level of selectivity, but only with marginal sensitivity. Finally, responses to the temporal manipulation did not yield any group differences, suggesting that while atypical multisensory temporal processing has been well documented in autism at the level of behavior and perception, these issues may be intact at the physiological level. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).

Although autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is associated with significant mental health concerns, little is known about suicidality, particularly among youth. To address this critical gap in the literature, the current study examined the predictive validity of (1) demographics, (2) core autism symptoms, (3) cognitive abilities and adaptive behavior, (4) comorbid psychopathology, and (5) medical problems, for suicide-related behaviors among autistic youth (N = 481; M age  = 11.56 years). As indices of suicide-related behaviors, parents reported on whether the child had ever (1) talked about killing themselves, and (2) engaged in deliberate self-harm or attempted suicide. These two suicide-related outcomes had distinct clinical correlates, including child age, parental education, restricted and repetitive behaviors, IQ and adaptive behavior, affective and conduct problems, and medical concerns.

Individuals diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) have difficulty perceiving and expressing emotions. Since prosodic changes in speech (i.e. changes in intonation, stress, rhythm, etc.) are crucial for extracting information about the emotional state of a speaker, an inability to perceive and interpret these prosodic changes may be related to impairments in social communication. This study used non-verbal emotional voice-clips to examine the ability of autistic and typically-developing children (7-13 years old) to extract affect from changes in prosody. This research also explored whether difficulty extracting affective intent from changes in prosody may be related to social competence. Autistic (n = 26) and typically-developing (n = 26) children accurately matched emotional voice-clips to emotion words, suggesting autistic children can accurately extract the affective meaning conveyed by changes in prosody. Autistic children were less accurate at matching the voice-clips to emotional faces, suggesting that autistic children may struggle to make use of prosodic information in a social context. Across both autistic and typically-developing children, prosody-face matching accuracy was found to predict overall social competence, as well as social inferencing abilities, suggesting that the inability to utilize affective information derived from a speaker's voice may interfere with effective social communication.

The current study sought to examine the contribution of auditory and visual statistical learning on language and social competency abilities as well as whether decreased statistical learning abilities are related to increased autistic traits. To answer these questions, participants' (N = 95) auditory and visual statistical learning abilities, language, social competency, and level of autistic traits were assessed. Although the relationships observed were relatively small in magnitude, our results demonstrated that visual statistical learning related to language and social competency abilities and that auditory learning was more related to autism symptomatology than visual statistical learning. Furthermore, the relationship between visual statistical learning and social competency was mediated by language comprehension abilities, suggesting that impairments in statistical learning may cascade into impairments in language and social abilities.

During our everyday lives, we are confronted with a vast amount of information from several sensory modalities. This multisensory information needs to be appropriately integrated for us to effectively engage with and learn from our world. Research carried out over the last half century has provided new insights into the way such multisensory processing improves human performance and perception; the neurophysiological foundations of multisensory function; the time course for its development; how multisensory abilities differ in clinical populations; and, most recently, the links between multisensory processing and cognitive abilities. This review summarizes the extant literature on multisensory function in typical and atypical circumstances, discusses the implications of the work carried out to date for theory and research, and points toward next steps for advancing the field.

Children who have been diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) often show a marked deficit in measures of social cognition. In autistic adults, measures of social cognition have been shown to relate to differences in brain synchronization (as measured by fMRI) when individuals are processing naturalistic stimuli, such as movies. However, whether children who differ in their degree of autistic traits, with or without a diagnosis of ASD, differ in their neural responses to movies has not yet been investigated. In the current study, neural synchrony, measured using fMRI, was examined in three groups of children aged 7 to 12, who differed with respect to scores on a measure of autistic traits associated with social impairment and whether or not they had been diagnosed with ASD. While watching the movie 'Despicable Me', those diagnosed with ASD had significantly less neural synchrony in areas that have been previously shown to be associated with social cognition (e.g. areas related to 'theory of mind'), and plot following (e.g. the lateral prefrontal cortex), than those who did not have an ASD diagnosis. In contrast, two groups who differed in their degree of autistic traits, but did not have a diagnosis of ASD, showed no significant differences in neural synchrony across the whole brain. These results shed some light on how autistic traits may contribute to an individual's conscious experience of the world, and how, for children with ASD, that experience may differ markedly from that of those without ASD., (Copyright © 2020 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Recent studies have suggested that individuals who exhibit heightened sensitivity also exhibit higher rates and severity of restricted interests and repetitive behaviours. This line of research has been conducted almost exclusively through caregiver reports of sensitivity. Here, a more rigorous psychophysics paradigm was applied to assess sensory sensitivity and relate hypersensitivity to restricted interests and repetitive behaviours. In addition, commonly used questionnaire measures of sensory sensitivity were collected to determine if self-reported measures accurately reflect behavioural measures of sensory sensitivity. In all, 90 typically developing participants completed a visual detection task, a questionnaire measure of sensory processing and a measure of restricted interests and repetitive behaviours. Visual sensitivity, measured both behaviourally and with questionnaires, is positively related to restricted interests and repetitive behaviours. Surprisingly, visual sensitivity as measured behaviourally and through self-report are unrelated. Furthermore, a regression analysis suggests that while restricted interests and repetitive behaviours can be predicted based on both behavioural and self-reported sensitivity, these two predictors account for different portions of the variance in restricted interests and repetitive behaviours. Thus, while these results provide evidence supporting the contribution of sensory sensitivity to restricted interests and repetitive behaviours, these results also indicate that behavioural and questionnaire measures of sensory sensitivity are measuring two distinct constructs. We hypothesize that behavioural measures are measuring sensory sensitivity , while questionnaires measures are in fact measuring sensory reactivity .

Recent studies have provided evidence for both a positive and a negative effect of orthography on second language speech learning. However, not much is known about whether orthography can trigger a McGurk-like effect (McGurk & MacDonald, 1976) in second language speech learning. This study examined whether exposure to auditory and orthographic input may lead to a McGurk-like effect in naïve English-speaking participants learning a second language with Spanish phonology and orthography. Specifically, it reports on (a) production of non-target-like combinations such as [lj] as in [po lj o] for -[po j o], where the auditory Spanish [j] and the first language English [l] that correspond to the shared digraph are integrated, and (b) fusion quantified in terms of [z] devoicing such as [ z ̥apito] for < z apito>-[ z apito]. Moreover, the effects of (a) type of grapheme-to-sound correspondence, (b) position in the word, and (c) condition of training and testing were examined. Participants were assigned to four groups: (a) auditory only, (b) orthography at training and production, (c) orthography at training, and (d) orthography at production. The positions included word-initial and word-medial. The grapheme-to-sound correspondences consisted of -[b], -[δ], -[s] and -[j]. Results were indicative of a McGurk-like effect only for the Spanish digraph . The highest rate of combination productions was attested in the orthography-training condition in the word-medial position.

Metabotropic glutamate receptor subtype-5 (mGluR5) activity regulates a variety of behavioral pathologies associated with alcohol addiction. The main goal of this study was to determine if mGluR5 regulates the induction of ethanol-induced locomotor sensitization, which is a model of experience-dependent plasticity following initial exposure to drugs of abuse. The extracellular signal-regulated kinase (ERK 1/2 ) pathway is downstream of mGluR5 and implicated in alcohol addiction; however, its role in sensitization remains unexplored. We sought to determine if mGluR5-mediated changes in ethanol-induced sensitization are associated with changes in ERK 1/2 phosphorylation (pERK 1/2 ) in specific brain regions. Adult male DBA/2 J mice were tested for acute locomotor response to ethanol (0 or 2 g/kg, IP) followed by a 9-day induction period in which the mGluR5 antagonist MPEP (0 or 30 mg/kg, IP) was administered prior to ethanol (0 or 2.5 g/kg, IP). One day later, ethanol (2 g/kg) produced a robust within- and between-group increase in locomotor activity, indicating sensitization in mice that received MPEP (0 mg/kg) during induction. MPEP (30 mg/kg) treatment during induction resulted in locomotor response to ethanol (2 g/kg) challenge that was equivalent to an acute response, indicating full blockade of sensitization. Sensitization was associated with increased pERK 1/2 immunoreactivity (IR) in nucleus accumbens shell (AcbSh) and a reduction in lateral habenula (LHb), both of which were blocked by MPEP treatment during induction. Sensitization was also associated with mGluR5-independent increases in pERK 1/2 IR in the nucleus accumbens core and decreases in the dentate gyrus and lateral septum. These data indicate that mGluR5 activity is required for the induction of ethanol locomotor sensitization and associated changes in ERK 1/2 phosphorylation in the AcbSh and LHb, which raises the hypothesis that mGluR5-mediated cell signaling in these brain regions may mediate the induction of sensitization. Elucidating mechanisms of sensitization may increase understanding of how ethanol hijacks behavioral functions during the development of addiction., (Copyright © 2019 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

The objective of this study was to examine the relationship between sensory hypersensitivity and restricted interests and repetitive behaviours associated with autism spectrum disorder and their typically-developing peers. Furthermore, the aims included the examination of the relationship across sensory modalities and various types of restricted interests and repetitive behaviours. Data were collected from the parents of 114 children: 49 of whom were diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder and 65 typically-developing children. Parents completed the Sensory Profile 2 - Child Version and the Repetitive Behaviours Questionnaire, Second Edition. The results suggested that sensory hypersensitivity is strongly related to the core autism spectrum disorder symptom of repetitive behaviours. This relationship was not specific to autism spectrum disorder; repetitive behaviours significantly increased with sensory hypersensitivity in typically-developing individuals as well. This effect was consistent across all modalities in both autism spectrum disorder and typically developing groups; group differences were observed in the oral and tactile modalities. Furthermore, sensory hypersensitivity was significantly predictive of repetitive behaviours in all participants, autism spectrum disorder and typically-developing, and importantly, autism spectrum disorder diagnosis did not add any predictive influence above and beyond sensory hypersensitivity. Finally, sensory hypersensitivity was significantly predictive of all subdomains of repetitive behaviours, including repetitive motor movements, rigidity and adherence to routine, preoccupation with restricted patterns of interest and unusual sensory interests, and diagnosis added no predictive ability beyond sensory hypersensitivity.

Face processing in autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is thought to be atypical, but it is unclear whether differences in visual conjunctive processing are specific to faces. To address this, we adapted a previously established eye-tracking paradigm which modulates the need for conjunctive processing by varying the degree of feature ambiguity in faces and objects. Typically-developed (TD) participants showed a canonical pattern of conjunctive processing: High-ambiguity objects were processed more conjunctively than low-ambiguity objects, and faces were processed in an equally conjunctive manner regardless of ambiguity level. In contrast, autistic individuals did not show differences in conjunctive processing based on stimulus category, providing evidence that atypical visual conjunctive processing in ASD is the result of a domain general lack of perceptual specialization.

Research shows that children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) differ in their behavioral patterns of responding to sensory stimuli (i.e., sensory responsiveness) and in various other aspects of sensory functioning relative to typical peers. This study explored relations between measures of sensory responsiveness and multisensory speech perception and integration in children with and without ASD. Participants were 8-17 year old children, 18 with ASD and 18 matched typically developing controls. Participants completed a psychophysical speech perception task, and parents reported on children's sensory responsiveness. Psychophysical measures (e.g., audiovisual accuracy, temporal binding window) were associated with patterns of sensory responsiveness (e.g., hyporesponsiveness, sensory seeking). Results indicate that differences in multisensory speech perception and integration covary with atypical patterns of sensory responsiveness.

Statistical learning is an implicit process that allows individuals to track and predict incoming events from their environment. Given that information is highly structured over time, events become predictable, allowing these individuals to make better sense of their environment. Among the studies that have examined statistical learning in attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), findings have been mixed. Our goal was to examine whether increased ADHD symptomatology related to decreased auditory and visual statistical learning abilities. To investigate this, we examined the entire range of ADHD symptomatology using a Research Domain Criteria approach with a clinically reliable questionnaire in addition to well-established auditory and visual statistical learning paradigms. Total ADHD symptomatology was not related to auditory and visual statistical learning. An identical pattern emerged when inattention and hyperactivity components were separated, indicating that neither of these distinct behavioral symptoms of ADHD are related to statistical learning abilities. Findings from the current study converge with other studies but go beyond finding a lack of a significant relationship - through Bayesian analyses, these data provide novel evidence directly supporting the hypothesis that ADHD symptomatology and statistical learning are decoupled. This finding held for overall levels of ADHD symptomatology as well as the subdomains of inattention and hyperactivity, suggesting that the ability to pick up on patterns in both auditory and visual domains is intact in ADHD. Future work should consider investigating statistical learning in ADHD across ages and beyond auditory and visual domains.

Integrating information across the visual field into an ensemble (e.g., seeing the forest from the trees) is an effective strategy to efficiently process the visual world, and one that is often impaired in autism spectrum disorder. Individual differences in sensory processing predict ensemble encoding, providing a potential mechanism for differing perceptual strategies across individuals, and possibly across diagnostic groups exhibiting atypical sensory processing. Here, we explore whether ensemble encoding is associated with traits associated with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Participants (N=68) were presented with an ensemble display consisting of circles of varying sizes and colors, and were asked to remember the size of the red and blue circles, while ignoring the green circles. Participants were then cued to a target location after a brief delay, and instructed to report the remembered size of the circle they had previously viewed in that location, as ensemble information commonly biases memory for individual objects toward the probed mean of a set of similar objects. The Autism-spectrum Quotient (AQ) was completed to measure each individual's level of autistic traits. We found that an individual's level of ensemble perception, measured as their bias toward the probed mean, was negatively associated with a higher level of ASD traits. These results suggest that individuals with higher levels of ASD traits are less likely to integrate perceptual information. These findings may shed light on different perceptual processing within the autism spectrum, and provide insight into the relationship between individual differences and ensemble encoding.

For many cochlear implant (CI) users, visual cues are vitally important for interpreting the impoverished auditory speech information that an implant conveys. Although the temporal relationship between auditory and visual stimuli is crucial for how this information is integrated, audiovisual temporal processing in CI users is poorly understood. In this study, we tested unisensory (auditory alone, visual alone) and multisensory (audiovisual) temporal processing in postlingually deafened CI users (n = 48) and normal-hearing controls (n = 54) using simultaneity judgment (SJ) and temporal order judgment (TOJ) tasks. We varied the timing onsets between the auditory and visual components of either a syllable/viseme or a simple flash/beep pairing, and participants indicated either which stimulus appeared first (TOJ) or if the pair occurred simultaneously (SJ). Results indicate that temporal binding windows-the interval within which stimuli are likely to be perceptually 'bound'-are not significantly different between groups for either speech or non-speech stimuli. However, the point of subjective simultaneity for speech was less visually leading in CI users, who interestingly, also had improved visual-only TOJ thresholds. Further signal detection analysis suggests that this SJ shift may be due to greater visual bias within the CI group, perhaps reflecting heightened attentional allocation to visual cues.

It has been recently theorized that atypical sensory processing in autism relates to difficulties in social communication. Through a series of tasks concurrently assessing multisensory temporal processes, multisensory integration and speech perception in 76 children with and without autism, we provide the first behavioral evidence of such a link. Temporal processing abilities in children with autism contributed to impairments in speech perception. This relationship was significantly mediated by their abilities to integrate social information across auditory and visual modalities. These data describe the cascading impact of sensory abilities in autism, whereby temporal processing impacts multisensory information of social information, which, in turn, contributes to deficits in speech perception. These relationships were found to be specific to autism, specific to multisensory but not unisensory integration, and specific to the processing of social information.

Binding across sensory modalities yields substantial perceptual benefits, including enhanced speech intelligibility. The coincidence of sensory inputs across time is a fundamental cue for this integration process. Recent work has suggested that individuals with diagnoses of schizophrenia (SZ) and autism spectrum disorder (ASD) will characterize auditory and visual events as synchronous over larger temporal disparities than their neurotypical counterparts. Namely, these clinical populations possess an enlarged temporal binding window (TBW). Although patients with SZ and ASD share aspects of their symptomatology, phenotypic similarities may result from distinct etiologies. To examine similarities and variances in audiovisual temporal function in these two populations, individuals diagnosed with ASD (n = 46; controls n = 40) and SZ (n = 16, controls = 16) completed an audiovisual simultaneity judgment task. In addition to standard psychometric analyses, synchrony judgments were assessed using Bayesian causal inference modeling. This approach permits distinguishing between distinct causes of an enlarged TBW: an a priori bias to bind sensory information and poor fidelity in the sensory representation. Findings indicate that both ASD and SZ populations show deficits in multisensory temporal acuity. Importantly, results suggest that while the wider TBWs in ASD most prominently results from atypical priors, the wider TBWs in SZ results from a trend toward changes in prior and weaknesses in the sensory representations. Results are discussed in light of current ASD and SZ theories and highlight that different perceptual training paradigms focused on improving multisensory integration may be most effective in these two clinical populations and emphasize that similar phenotypes may emanate from distinct mechanistic causes., (© 2018 Federation of European Neuroscience Societies and John Wiley & Sons Ltd.)