Abstract
This study provides new evidence of deficient auditory cortical processing of speech in noise in autism spectrum disorders (ASD). Speech-evoked responses (∼100-300 ms) in quiet and background noise were evaluated in typically-developing (TD) children and children with ASD. ASD responses showed delayed timing (both conditions) and reduced amplitudes (quiet) compared to TD responses. As expected, TD responses in noise were delayed and reduced compared to quiet responses. However, minimal quiet-to-noise response differences were found in children with ASD, presumably because quiet responses were already severely degraded. Moreover, ASD quiet responses resembled TD noise responses, implying that children with ASD process speech in quiet only as well as TD children do in background noise.
| Original language | English (US) |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 1185-1196 |
| Number of pages | 12 |
| Journal | Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders |
| Volume | 39 |
| Issue number | 8 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Aug 2009 |
Funding
Acknowledgments This research was supported by NIH R01 DC01510. The authors declare that they have no competing financial interests. We would like to thank the children who participated in this study and their families; Trent Nicol, Gabriella Musacchia, and Daniel Abrams for assisting with peak picking; Trent Nicol and Erika Skoe for their contributions to this research, particularly in technical aspects of data processing and software development; Jane Hornickel for her assistance with data collection.
Keywords
- Autism
- Background noise
- Children
- Cortical encoding
- Evoked potentials
- Speech
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Developmental and Educational Psychology