Rapid neural categorization of angry and fearful faces is specifically impaired in boys with autism spectrum disorder.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Difficulties with facial expression processing may be associated with the characteristic social impairments in individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Emotional face processing in ASD has been investigated in an abundance of behavioral and EEG studies, yielding, however, mixed and inconsistent results.

Methods

We combined fast periodic visual stimulation (FPVS) with EEG to assess the neural sensitivity to implicitly detect briefly presented facial expressions among a stream of neutral faces, in 23 boys with ASD and 23 matched typically developing (TD) boys. Neutral faces with different identities were presented at 6 Hz, periodically interleaved with an expressive face (angry, fearful, happy, sad in separate sequences) every fifth image (i.e., 1.2 Hz oddba

SUBMITTER: Van der Donck S 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7496330 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature