Unraveling the developmental dynamic of visual exploration of social interactions in autism

  1. Nada Kojovic  Is a corresponding author
  2. Sezen Cekic
  3. Santiago Herce Castañón
  4. Martina Franchini
  5. Holger Franz Sperdin
  6. Corrado Sandini
  7. Reem Kais Jan
  8. Daniela Zöller
  9. Lylia Ben Hadid
  10. Daphné Bavelier
  11. Marie Schaer  Is a corresponding author
  1. University of Geneva, Switzerland
  2. Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Mexico
  3. Fondation Pôle Autisme, Switzerland
  4. Mohammed Bin Rashid University of Medicine and Health Sciences, United Arab Emirates
  5. Bosch Sensortec GmbH, Germany

Abstract

Atypical deployment of social gaze is present early on in toddlers with autism spectrum disorders (ASDs). Yet, studies characterizing the developmental dynamic behind it are scarce. Here we used a data-driven method to delineate the developmental change in visual exploration of social interaction over childhood years in autism. Longitudinal eye-tracking data were acquired as children with ASD and their typically developing (TD) peers freely explored a short cartoon movie. We found divergent moment-to-moment gaze patterns in children with ASD compared to their TD peers. This divergence was particularly evident in sequences that displayed social interactions between characters and even more so in children with lower developmental and functional levels. The basic visual properties of the animated scene did not account for the enhanced divergence. Over childhood years, these differences dramatically increased to become more idiosyncratic. These findings suggest that social attention should be targeted early in clinical treatments.

Data availability

The Proximity Index method code and example data are publicly available at (https://github.com/nadakojovic/ProximityIndexMethod (DOI 10.5281/zenodo.10409645) and the data and codes used to produce figures of the current paper can be accessed at https://github.com/nadakojovic/ProximityIndexPaper (DOI 10.5281/zenodo.10409651).

Article and author information

Author details

  1. Nada Kojovic

    Departement of Psychiatry, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland
    For correspondence
    nada.kojovic@unige.ch
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
    ORCID icon "This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0003-0116-2485
  2. Sezen Cekic

    Faculte de Psychologie et Science de l'Education, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
  3. Santiago Herce Castañón

    Instituto de Investigaciones en Matemáticas Aplicadas y en Sistemas, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Mexico, Mexico
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
  4. Martina Franchini

    Fondation Pôle Autisme, Geneva, Switzerland
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
  5. Holger Franz Sperdin

    Departement of Psychiatry, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
    ORCID icon "This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0002-3438-1572
  6. Corrado Sandini

    Departement of Psychiatry, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
    ORCID icon "This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0003-2933-1607
  7. Reem Kais Jan

    College of Medicine, Mohammed Bin Rashid University of Medicine and Health Sciences, Dubai, United Arab Emirates
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
    ORCID icon "This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0002-1685-5594
  8. Daniela Zöller

    Bosch Sensortec GmbH, Reutlingen, Germany
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
    ORCID icon "This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0002-7049-0696
  9. Lylia Ben Hadid

    Departement of Psychiatry, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
  10. Daphné Bavelier

    Faculte de Psychologie et Science de l'Education, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
  11. Marie Schaer

    Departement of Psychiatry, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland
    For correspondence
    marie.schaer@unige.ch
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.

Funding

National Centre of Competence in Research SYNAPSY (51NF40-185897)

  • Marie Schaer

Swiss National Science Foundation (163859)

  • Marie Schaer

Swiss National Science Foundation (190084)

  • Marie Schaer

Swiss National Science Foundation (202235)

  • Marie Schaer

Swiss National Science Foundation (212653)

  • Marie Schaer

ERC Synergy fund BrainPlay - The Self-teaching Brain grant (810580)

  • Daphné Bavelier

Fondation Privée des Hôpitaux Universitaires de Genève (https://www.fondationhug.org

  • Marie Schaer

Fondation Pôle Autisme

  • Marie Schaer

The funders had no role in study design, data collection and interpretation, or the decision to submit the work for publication.

Ethics

Human subjects: The study protocol was approved by the Ethics Committee of the Faculty of Medicine of Geneva University, Switzerland (Swissethics, protocol 12-163/Psy 12-014, referral number PB_2016-01880). All families gave written informed consent to participate.

Copyright

© 2024, Kojovic et al.

This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License permitting unrestricted use and redistribution provided that the original author and source are credited.

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  1. Nada Kojovic
  2. Sezen Cekic
  3. Santiago Herce Castañón
  4. Martina Franchini
  5. Holger Franz Sperdin
  6. Corrado Sandini
  7. Reem Kais Jan
  8. Daniela Zöller
  9. Lylia Ben Hadid
  10. Daphné Bavelier
  11. Marie Schaer
(2024)
Unraveling the developmental dynamic of visual exploration of social interactions in autism
eLife 13:e85623.
https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.85623

Share this article

https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.85623

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