Joint attention in toddlers and pre-schoolers with ASD: fNIRS data

The hypothesis was tested that children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) would show atypical activation during response to joint attention in a live task.
For each child, fNIRS data were collected while they watched silent excerpts from a cartoon (the object of joint attention) which were introduced by a computer sound (solo attention condition) or by the experimenter (joint attention condition) and were interspliced by a static baseline.
The results of this study suggest that, unlike their TD peers, children with ASD do not show clear signs of activation during RJA in right temporal cortical areas. On the contrary, haemodynamic activity in the same region seemed to indicate deactivation during RJA as compared to solo attention (at least for HbO), which was interpreted as a possible sign of disengagement from a challenging stimulus, namely a social one.