Saccadic movements using eye-tracking technology in individuals with autism spectrum disorders: pilot study

Arquivos de Neuro-Psiquiatria

Marcos T. Mercadante¹  Elizeu C. Macedo¹  Patrícia M. Baptista¹  Cristiane S. Paula¹  José S. Schwartzman¹ 

[1] ,Mackenzie Presbyterian UniversitySão Paulo SP ,Brazil

关键词: autism;    Asperger’s syndrome;    pervasive development disorder;    eye movement;    autismo;    síndrome de Asperger;    transtornos globais do desenvolvimento infantil;    movimento ocular;   

DOI  :  10.1590/S0004-282X2006000400003

来源: SciELO

【 摘 要 】

OBJECTIVE: To verify differences in the visual scanning strategies between pervasive developmental disorders (PDD) and controls when they are observing social and non-social pictures. METHOD: PDD group (PDDG) comprised by 10 non-retarded subjects (age from 4 to 41) and age-matched control group (CG). Nine social pictures with human beings (including two pictures of cat mask), and 3 nonsocial pictures of objects were presented for 5 seconds. Saccadic movements and fixation were recorded with equipment EyeGaze® (LC Technologies Inc.). RESULTS: PDDG (mean=292.73, SE=67.62) presented longer duration of saccadic movements for social pictures compared to CG (mean=136.06, SE=14.01) (p=0.04). The CG showed a higher number of fixations in the picture 7 (a women using a cat mask, with the eyes erased) (CG: mean=3.40; PDDG: mean=1.80; p=0.007). CONCLUSION: The results suggest differences in strategies that PDD explore human picture. Moreover, these strategies seem not to be affected by the lack of expected part of the face (the eyes).

【 授权许可】

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