Skip to main content

Spectrum: Autism Research News

Tag: emotion processing

April 2010

Parental trust

by  /  21 April 2010

Many parents of children with autism show some mild traits of the disorder. Research on this group — labeled with the ‘broad autism phenotype’, or BAP — suggests that the genetic underpinnings that lead to language or social problems can manifest in very different ways.

Comments

Autism not a fundamental problem of attention, study says

by  /  16 April 2010

Toddlers with autism pay less attention to faces than do healthy controls, but both groups give equal attention to objects, according to a study published in the Archives of General Psychiatry. The findings challenge the idea that individuals with autism have a generalized problem with attention, suggesting instead that they struggle with attending specifically to social stimuli, researchers say.

Comments

Autism symptoms emerge in infancy, sibling study finds

by  /  6 April 2010

At 6 months of age, babies who will later develop autism begin to lose some of their social skills and continue to regress until age 3, according to a study published in the Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry.

Comments
March 2010

Face recognition is distinct genetic skill, studies find

by  /  11 March 2010

The ability to recognize faces and interpret facial expressions is programmed partly by genes and inherited separately from other traits, according to three independent studies published this year.

Comments

Tried and trusted

by  /  3 March 2010

The latest findings on oxytocin — a.k.a. the ‘trust hormone’ — secure its position as a frontrunner among emerging treatments for autism.

Comments
February 2010

People with autism stumble on self-other distinctions

by  /  25 February 2010

When thinking about themselves, adults with autism have lower activity in two specific brain regions than do healthy controls, according to an imaging study published in the February issue of Brain.

Comments
December 2009

Autism shares features with cerebellar syndromes

by  /  3 December 2009

There are clinical, anatomical and genetic overlaps between autism and certain rare developmental disorders of the cerebellum, and these disorders may help scientists understand autism, according to several studies published in the past year.

Comments
November 2009

Baby sib studies reveal differences in brain response

by  /  30 November 2009

Studies on younger siblings of children with autism are finding that during tests of sensory or perceptual processing, these baby sibs show abnormally fast brain responses, rather than a delay.

Comments

Amygdala found to govern notion of personal space

by  /  13 November 2009

A report in the October issue of Nature Neuroscience says the amygdala — the brain region that controls emotions, as well as the way individuals interpret and respond to social situations and recognize possible threats — governs the preference for personal space.

Comments

Autism marked by altered trajectory of brain growth

by  /  3 November 2009

Although the head overall is bigger in some children with autism, researchers have found more informative differences in size — some smaller, some larger — across regions of the brain.

Comments