Assessing individual differences in the speed and accuracy of intersensory processing in young children: The intersensory processing efficiency protocol

Hyper-focus, sticky attention, and springy attention in young autistic children: Associations with sensory behaviors and cognitive ability

The autistic-developed monotropism account suggests that atypical, domain-general attentional hyper-focus on interests is a central aspect of autism, but domain-general attention differences in autism can manifest differently. Prior research suggests autistic children are often slow to disengage attention from stimuli-a pattern often called "sticky attention"-and that they can show reduced novelty preference. These attentional patterns could influence sensory experiences and learning. We used eye-tracking to investigate novelty preference and "sticky attention" in young autistic children; we also examined whether attentional patterns were related to cognitive abilities and caregiver-reported sensory responsiveness. A total of 46 autistic and 28 nonautistic participants, aged between 2 and 4 years, provided usable data. We found no evidence that autistic children exhibited greater "sticky attention" than nonautistics, but "sticky attention" in autism was associated with more caregiver-reported sensory hyper-responsiveness, seeking/interests, and enhanced perception. Autistic children also nonsignificantly trended toward exhibiting reduced novelty preference. Unexpectedly, the time-course of this trending novelty preference difference implied it was not driven by reduced orienting to novelty, but increased returning to already-familiarized stimuli: what we call "springy attention." Exploratory analyses of data from the attentional disengagement task suggest autistic participants may have exhibited greater "springy attention," though further research with paradigms optimized for measuring this construct should confirm this. Importantly, "springy attention" was robustly related to reduced cognitive abilities and greater caregiver-reported hypo-responsiveness. Thus, this study illuminates two distinct domain-general attentional patterns, each with distinct correlates in young autistic children, which could have important implications for understanding autistic children's learning, development, and experiences.

Synchrony perception across senses: A systematic review of temporal binding window changes from infancy to adolescence in typical and atypical development

Sensory integration is increasingly acknowledged as being crucial for the development of cognitive and social abilities. However, its developmental trajectory is still little understood. This systematic review delves into the topic by investigating the literature about the developmental changes from infancy through adolescence of the Temporal Binding Window (TBW) - the epoch of time within which sensory inputs are perceived as simultaneous and therefore integrated. Following comprehensive searches across PubMed, Elsevier, and PsycInfo databases, only experimental, behavioral, English-language, peer-reviewed studies on multisensory temporal processing in 0-17-year-olds have been included. Non-behavioral, non-multisensory, and non-human studies have been excluded as those that did not directly focus on the TBW. The selection process was independently performed by two Authors. The 39 selected studies involved 2859 participants in total. Findings indicate a predisposition towards cross-modal asynchrony sensitivity and a composite, still unclear, developmental trajectory, with atypical development associated to increased asynchrony tolerance. These results highlight the need for consistent and thorough research into TBW development to inform potential interventions.

Individual Differences in Multisensory Attention Skills in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder Predict Language and Symptom Severity: Evidence from the Multisensory Attention Assessment Protocol (MAAP)

Children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) show atypical attention, particularly for social events. The new Multisensory Attention Assessment Protocol (MAAP) assesses fine-grained individual differences in attention disengagement, maintenance, and audiovisual matching for social and nonsocial events. We investigated the role of competing stimulation on attention, and relations with language and symptomatology in children with ASD and typical controls. Findings revealed: (1) the MAAP differentiated children with ASD from controls, (2) greater attention to social events predicted better language for both groups and lower symptom severity in children with ASD, (3) different pathways from attention to language were evident in children with ASD versus controls. The MAAP provides an ideal attention assessment for revealing diagnostic group differences and relations with outcomes.

Effects of English versus Spanish language exposure on basic multisensory attention skills across 3 to 36 months of age

Recent research has demonstrated that individual differences in infant attention to faces and voices of women speaking predict language outcomes in childhood. These findings have been generated using two new audiovisual attention assessments appropriate for infants and young children, the Multisensory Attention Assessment Protocol (MAAP) and the Intersensory Processing Efficiency Protocol (IPEP). The MAAP and IPEP assess three basic attention skills (sustaining attention, shifting/disengaging, intersensory matching), as well as distractibility, deployed in the context of naturalistic audiovisual social (women speaking English) and nonsocial events (objects impacting a surface). Might children with differential exposure to Spanish versus English show different patterns of attention to social events on these protocols as a function of language familiarity? We addressed this question in several ways using children (n = 81 dual-language learners; n = 23 monolingual-language learners) from South Florida, tested longitudinally across 3-36 months. Surprisingly, results indicated no significant English language advantage on any attention measure for children from monolingual English versus dual English-Spanish language environments. Second, for dual-language learners, exposure to English changed across age, decreasing slightly from 3-12 months and then increasing considerably by 36 months. Furthermore, for dual-language learners, structural equation modeling analyses revealed no English language advantage on the MAAP or IPEP as a function of degree of English language exposure. The few relations found were in the direction of greater performance for children with greater Spanish exposure. Together, findings indicate no English language advantage for basic multisensory attention skills assessed by the MAAP or IPEP between the ages of 3 to 36 months. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

The effects of socioeconomic status on working memory in childhood are partially mediated by intersensory processing of audiovisual events in infancy

Socioeconomic status (SES) is a well-established predictor of individual differences in childhood language and cognitive functioning, including executive functions such as working memory. In infancy, intersensory processing-selectively attending to properties of events that are redundantly specified across the senses at the expense of non-redundant, irrelevant properties-also predicts language development. Our recent research demonstrates that individual differences in intersensory processing in infancy predict a variety of language outcomes in childhood, even after controlling for SES. However, relations among intersensory processing and cognitive outcomes such as working memory have not yet been investigated. Thus, the present study examines relations between intersensory processing in infancy and working memory in early childhood, and the role of SES in this relation. Children (N = 101) received the Multisensory Attention Assessment Protocol at 12-months to assess intersensory processing (face-voice and object-sound matching) and received the WPPSI at 36-months to assess working memory. SES was indexed by maternal education, paternal education, and income. A variety of novel findings emerged. 1) Individual differences in intersensory processing at 12-months predicted working memory at 36-months of age even after controlling for SES. 2) Individual differences in SES predicted intersensory processing at 12-months of age. 3) The well-established relation between SES and working memory was partially mediated by intersensory processing. Children from families of higher-SES have better intersensory processing skills at 12-months and this combination of factors predicts greater working memory two years later at 36-months. Together these findings reveal the role of intersensory processing in cognitive functioning.

Intersensory processing of faces and voices at 6 months predicts language outcomes at 18, 24, and 36 months of age

Intersensory processing of social events (e.g., matching sights and sounds of audiovisual speech) is a critical foundation for language development. Two recently developed protocols, the Multisensory Attention Assessment Protocol (MAAP) and the Intersensory Processing Efficiency Protocol (IPEP), assess individual differences in intersensory processing at a sufficiently fine-grained level for predicting developmental outcomes. Recent research using the MAAP demonstrates 12-month intersensory processing of face-voice synchrony predicts language outcomes at 18- and 24-months, holding traditional predictors (parent language input, SES) constant. Here, we build on these findings testing younger infants using the IPEP, a more comprehensive, fine-grained index of intersensory processing. Using a longitudinal sample of 103 infants, we tested whether intersensory processing (speed, accuracy) of faces and voices at 3- and 6-months predicts language outcomes at 12-, 18-, 24-, and 36-months, holding traditional predictors constant. Results demonstrate intersensory processing of faces and voices at 6-months (but not 3-months) accounted for significant unique variance in language outcomes at 18-, 24-, and 36-months, beyond that of traditional predictors. Findings highlight the importance of intersensory processing of face-voice synchrony as a foundation for language development as early as 6-months and reveal that individual differences assessed by the IPEP predict language outcomes even 2.5-years later.

Multisensory integration and interactions across vision, hearing, and somatosensation in autism spectrum development and typical development

Most prior studies of multisensory integration (MSI) in autism have measured MSI in only a single combination of modalities - typically audiovisual integration. The present study used onset reaction times (RTs) and 125-channel electroencephalography (EEG) to examine different forms of bimodal and trimodal MSI based on combinations of auditory (noise burst), somatosensory (finger tap), and visual (flash) stimuli presented in a spatially-aligned manner using a custom desktop apparatus. A total of 36 autistic and 19 non-autistic adolescents between the ages of 11-14 participated. Significant RT multisensory facilitation relative to summed unisensory RT was observed in both groups, as were significant differences between summed unisensory and multisensory ERPs. Although the present study's statistical approach was not intended to test effect latencies, these interactions may have begun as early as ∼45 ms, constituting "early" (<100 ms) MSI. RT and ERP measurements of MSI appeared independent of one another. Groups did not significantly differ in multisensory RT facilitation, but we found exploratory evidence of group differences in the magnitude of audiovisual interactions in ERPs. Future research should make greater efforts to explore MSI in under-represented populations, especially autistic people with intellectual disabilities and nonspeaking/minimally-verbal autistic people.

The multisensory cocktail party problem in children: Synchrony-based segregation of multiple talking faces improves in early childhood

Extraction of meaningful information from multiple talkers relies on perceptual segregation. The temporal synchrony statistics inherent in everyday audiovisual (AV) speech offer a powerful basis for perceptual segregation. We investigated the developmental emergence of synchrony-based perceptual segregation of multiple talkers in 3-7-year-old children. Children either saw four identical or four different faces articulating temporally jittered versions of the same utterance and heard the audible version of the same utterance either synchronized with one of the talkers or desynchronized with all of them. Eye tracking revealed that selective attention to the temporally synchronized talking face increased while attention to the desynchronized faces decreased with age and that attention to the talkers' mouth primarily drove responsiveness. These findings demonstrate that the temporal synchrony statistics inherent in fluent AV speech assume an increasingly greater role in perceptual segregation of the multisensory clutter created by multiple talking faces in early childhood.

Audiovisual synchrony detection for fluent speech in early childhood: An eye-tracking study

During childhood, the ability to detect audiovisual synchrony gradually sharpens for simple stimuli such as flashbeeps and single syllables. However, little is known about how children perceive synchrony for natural and continuous speech. This study investigated young children's gaze patterns while they were watching movies of two identical speakers telling stories side by side. Only one speaker's lip movements matched the voices and the other one either led or lagged behind the soundtrack by 600 ms. Children aged 3-6 years (n = 94, 52.13% males) showed an overall preference for the synchronous speaker, with no age-related changes in synchrony-detection sensitivity as indicated by similar gaze patterns across ages. However, viewing time to the synchronous speech was significantly longer in the auditory-leading (AL) condition compared with that in the visual-leading (VL) condition, suggesting asymmetric sensitivities for AL versus VL asynchrony have already been established in early childhood. When further examining gaze patterns on dynamic faces, we found that more attention focused on the mouth region was an adaptive strategy to read visual speech signals and thus associated with increased viewing time of the synchronous videos. Attention to detail, one dimension of autistic traits featured by local processing, has been found to be correlated with worse performances in speech synchrony processing. These findings extended previous research by showing the development of speech synchrony perception in young children, and may have implications for clinical populations (e.g., autism) with impaired multisensory integration.

Remote Data Collection During a Pandemic: A New Approach for Assessing and Coding Multisensory Attention Skills in Infants and Young Children

In early 2020, in-person data collection dramatically slowed or was completely halted across the world as many labs were forced to close due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Developmental researchers who assess looking time (especially those who rely heavily on in-lab eye-tracking or live coding techniques) were forced to re-think their methods of data collection. While a variety of remote or online platforms are available for gathering behavioral data outside of the typical lab setting, few are specifically designed for collecting and processing looking time data in infants and young children. To address these challenges, our lab developed several novel approaches for continuing data collection and coding for a remotely administered audiovisual looking time protocol. First, we detail a comprehensive approach for successfully administering the Multisensory Attention Assessment Protocol (MAAP), developed by our lab to assess multisensory attention skills (MASks; duration of looking, speed of shifting/disengaging, accuracy of audiovisual matching). The MAAP is administered from a distance (remotely) by using Zoom, Gorilla Experiment Builder, an internet connection, and a home computer. This new data collection approach has the advantage that participants can be tested in their homes. We discuss challenges and successes in implementing our approach for remote testing and data collection during an ongoing longitudinal project. Second, we detail an approach for estimating gaze direction and duration collected remotely from webcam recordings using a post processing toolkit (OpenFace) and demonstrate its effectiveness and precision. However, because OpenFace derives gaze estimates without translating them to an external frame of reference (i.e., the participant's screen), we developed a machine learning (ML) approach to overcome this limitation. Thus, third, we trained a ML algorithm [(artificial neural network (ANN)] to classify gaze estimates from OpenFace with respect to areas of interest (AOI) on the participant's screen (i.e., left, right, and center). We then demonstrate reliability between this approach and traditional coding approaches (e.g., coding gaze live). The combination of OpenFace and ML will provide a method to automate the coding of looking time for data collected remotely. Finally, we outline a series of best practices for developmental researchers conducting remote data collection for looking time studies.

The Multisensory Attention Assessment Protocol (MAAP): Characterizing individual differences in multisensory attention skills in infants and children and relations with language and cognition

Multisensory attention skills provide a crucial foundation for early cognitive, social, and language development, yet there are no fine-grained, individual difference measures of these skills appropriate for preverbal children. The Multisensory Attention Assessment Protocol (MAAP) fills this need. In a single video-based protocol requiring no language skills, the MAAP assesses individual differences in three fundamental building blocks of attention to multisensory events-the duration of attention maintenance, the accuracy of intersensory (audiovisual) matching, and the speed of shifting-for both social and nonsocial events, in the context of high and low competing visual stimulation. In Experiment 1, 2- to 5-year-old children (N = 36) received the MAAP and assessments of language and cognitive functioning. In Experiment 2 the procedure was streamlined and presented to 12-month-olds (N = 48). Both infants and children showed high levels of attention maintenance to social and nonsocial events, impaired attention maintenance and speed of shifting when competing stimulation was high, and significant intersensory matching. Children showed longer maintenance, faster shifting, and less impairment from competing stimulation than infants. In 2- to 5-year-old children, duration and accuracy were intercorrelated, showed increases with age, and predicted cognitive and language functioning. The MAAP opens the door to assessing developmental pathways between early attention patterns to audiovisual events and language, cognitive, and social development. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2018 APA, all rights reserved).