An auditory reflex that can be tested in newborns is slower and more sensitive in children with autism than in typically developing children, a divisive new study claims.

Read: Controversial study uncovers hearing glitch in autism »

This routinely tested ‘stapedial reflex’ could offer an attractive screening option for autism because it would allow clinicians to detect the disorder much earlier than existing diagnostic tests and with equipment readily available in a doctor’s office.

But some researchers SFARI.org spoke to shared deep skepticism about the notion that primary auditory deficits are a hallmark of autism, citing flaws in the design of the study.

At the heart of this disagreement lies a more fundamental question about the root cause of autism, and ultimately, whether it is a social or sensory problem.

Taken at face value, this study suggests that perceptual deficits, such as a brainstem glitch in the auditory system, represent cardinal features of autism. Many researchers maintain, however, that autism must arise from higher-level systems involved in controlling the brain’s social behavior circuits.

The answer may lie in which comes first: deficits in perceptual processing or a disruption of cortical circuitry. As Mayada Elsabbagh notes in a previous articleabout testing physiological responses in baby siblings of children with autism, that “is very much a ‘chicken or egg’ problem.”

What do you think?

• Could fundamental deficits in sensory processing and lower-level mechanisms in the brainstem lead to the dysfunction we see in autism, or are higher-level circuits more likely to be the key?

• Are autonomic responses — such as the stapedial reflex, as well as heart rate variability, pupil size and electrodermal responsiveness — worth pursuing as meaningful biomarkers? Or should we focus on the systems more directly associated with the core symptoms of autism?

• Do we need more and better treatments for the sensory sensitivity described in the story, as Temple Grandin and others have called for?

Share your thoughts in the comments section below. Or, to dig deeper, continue the conversation in the moderated SFARI Forum for researchers. Not yet a member? Learn how to register here.

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