Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Neural Correlates of Familiar and Unfamiliar Face Processing in Infants at Risk for Autism Spectrum Disorders

  • Original Paper
  • Published:
Brain Topography Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Examining the neural correlates associated with processing social stimuli offers a viable option to the challenge of studying early social processing in infants at risk for autism spectrum disorders (ASDs). The present investigation included 32 12-month olds at high risk for ASD and 24 low-risk control infants, defined on the basis of family history. Infants were presented with familiar and unfamiliar faces, and three components of interest were explored for amplitude and latency differences. The anticipated developmental effects of emerging hemispheric asymmetry for face-sensitive components (the N290 and P400) were observed, as were familiarity effects for a component related to attention (the Nc). Although there were no striking group differences in the neural response to faces, there was some evidence for a developmental lag in an attentional component for the high-risk group. The infant ASD endophenotype, though elusive, may be better defined through expanding the age of study and addressing change over time in response to varied stimuli.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4

Similar content being viewed by others

Notes

  1. The EGI electrode nets used in this project underwent an upgrade approximately 2 years after the project commenced, and all 64-channel sensor nets were replaced with 128-channel sensor nets. Out of the current sample, the number of children on whom data was collected on the 64- and 128-channel nets did not differ across group (Fisher’s exact test, p = .79), with 16 (66.7%) low-risk children and 20 (62.5%) high-risk children on the original 64-channel system.

References

  • Autism and Developmental Disabilities Monitoring Network (2009) Prevalence of autism spectrum disorders—Autism and Developmental Disabilities Monitoring Network, United States, 2006. MMWR Surveill Summ 58:1–20

    Google Scholar 

  • Burden MJ, Westerlund AJ, Armony-Sivan R, Nelson CA, Jacobson SW, Lozoff B, Angelilli ML, Jacobson JL (2007) An event-related potential study of attention and recognition memory in infants with iron-deficiency anemia. Pediatrics 120:e336–e345

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Carver LJ, Dawson G, Panagiotides H, Meltzoff AN, McPartland J, Gray J, Munson J (2003) Age-related differences in neural correlates of face recognition during the toddler and preschool years. Dev Psychobiol 42:148–159

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Cassel TD, Messinger DS, Ibanez LV, Haltigan JD, Acosta SI, Buchman AC (2007) Early social and emotional communication in the infant siblings of children with autism spectrum disorders: an examination of the broad phenotype. J Autism Dev Disord 37:122–132

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Csibra G, Kushnerenko E, Grossmann T (2008) Electrophysiological methods in studying infant cognitive development. In: Nelson CA, Luciana M (eds) Handbook of developmental cognitive neuroscience. MIT Press, Cambridge, pp 247–262

    Google Scholar 

  • Dawson G, Carver L, Meltzoff A, Panagiotides H, McPartland J, Webb S (2002) Neural correlates of face and object recognition in young children with autism spectrum disorder, developmental delay and typical development. Child Dev 73:700–717

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • de Haan M (2008) Neurocognitive mechanisms for the development of face processing. In: Nelson CA, Luciana M (eds) Handbook of developmental cognitive neuroscience. MIT Press, Cambridge, pp 509–520

    Google Scholar 

  • de Haan M, Nelson CA (1997) Recognition of the mother’s face by six-month-old infants: a neurobehavioral study. Child Dev 68:187–210

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • de Haan M, Nelson C (1999) Brain activity differentiates face and object processing in 6-month-old infants. Develop Psychol 35(4), 1113–1121

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • de Haan M, Johnson MH, Halit H (2003) Development of face-sensitive event-related potentials during infancy: a review. Int J Psychophysiol 51:45–58

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Elsabbagh M, Johnson MH (2010) Getting answers from babies about autism. Trends Cogn Sci 14:81–87

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Elsabbagh M, Volein A, Csibra G, Holmboe K, Garwood H, Tucker L et al (2009) Neural correlates of eye gaze processing in the infant broader autism phenotype. Biol Psychiatry 65(1), 31–38

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Folstein S, Rutter M (1977) Infantile autism: a genetic study of 21 twin pairs. J Child Psychol Psychiatry 18:297–321

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Halit H, de Haan M, Johnson MH (2003) Cortical specialisation for face processing: face-sensitive event-related potential components in 3- and 12-month-old infants. Neuroimage 19:1180–1193

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Halit H, Csibra G, Volein A, Johnson MH (2004) Face-sensitive cortical processing in early infancy. J Child Psychol Psychiatry 45:1228–1234

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Joyce C, Rossion B (2005) The face-sensitive N170 and VPP components manifest the same brain processes: the effect of reference selection site. Clin Neurophysiol 116:2613–2631

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Luyster R, Gotham K, Guthrie W, Coffing M, Petrak R, Pierce K, Bishop S, Esler A, Hus V, Oti R, Richler J, Risi S, Lord C (2009) The Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule-toddler module: a new module of a standardized diagnostic measure for autism spectrum disorders. J Autism Dev Disord 39:1305–1320

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • McCleery J, Akshoomoff N, Dobkins K, Carver L (2009) Atypical face versus object processing and hemispheric asymmetries in 10-month-old infants at risk for autism. Biol Psychiatry 66:950–957

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Mullen E (1995) Mullen scales of early learning. American Guidance Service, Inc, Circle Pines

    Google Scholar 

  • Nadig AS, Ozonoff S, Young GS, Rozga A, Sigman M, Rogers SJ (2007) A prospective study of response to name in infants at risk for autism. Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med 161:378–383

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Nelson CA, McCleery JP (2008) Use of event-related potentials in the study of typical and atypical development. J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry 47:1252–1261

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Nelson CA, Monk C (2001) The use of event-related potentials in the study of cognitive development. In: Nelson CA, Luciana M (eds) Handbook of developmental cognitive neuroscience. MIT Press, Cambridge, pp 125–136

    Google Scholar 

  • Noland JS, Reznick S, Stone W, Walden T, Sheridan EH (2010) Better working memory for non-social targets in infant siblings of children with Autism Spectrum Disorder. Develop Sci 13(1), 244–251

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ozonoff S, Iosif AM, Baguio F, Cook IC, Hill MM, Hutman T, Rogers SJ, Rozga A, Sangha S, Sigman M, Steinfeld MB, Young GS (2010) A prospective study of the emergence of early behavioral signs of autism. J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry 49:256–66.e1-2

    Google Scholar 

  • Palomo R, Belinchon M, Ozonoff S (2006) Autism and family home movies: a comprehensive review. J Dev Behav Pediatr 27:S59–S68

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Picton TW, Bentin S, Berg P, Donchin E, Hillyard SA, Johnson R, Miller GA, Ritter W, Ruchkin DS, Rugg MD, Taylor MJ (2000) Guidelines for using human event-related potentials to study cognition: recording standards and publication criteria. Psychophys 37:127–152

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Rogers S (2009) What are infant siblings teaching us about autism in infancy? Autism Res 2:125–137

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Rutter M, Bailey A, Lord C (2003) Social communication questionnaire. Western Psychological Services, Los Angeles

    Google Scholar 

  • Tager-Flusberg H (2010) The origins of social impairments in autism spectrum disorder: studies of infants at risk. Neural Netw 23:1072–1076

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Taylor MJ, Batty M, Itier RJ (2004) The faces of development: a review of early face processing over childhood. J Cogn Neurosci 16:1426–1442

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Webb S, Dawson G, Bernier R, Panagiotides H (2006) ERP evidence of atypical face processing in young children with autism. J Autism Dev Disord 36:881–890

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Wetherby AM, Woods J, Allen L, Cleary J, Dickinson H, Lord C (2004) Early indicators of autism spectrum disorders in the second year of life. J Autism Dev Disord 34:473–493

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Yirmiya N, Gamliel I, Pilowsky T, Feldman R, Baron-Cohen S, Sigman M (2006) The development of siblings of children with autism at 4 and 14 months: social engagement, communication, and cognition. J Child Psychol Psychiatry 47:511–523

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Zwaigenbaum L, Bryson S, Rogers T, Roberts W, Brian J, Szatmari P (2005) Behavioral manifestations of autism in the first year of life. Int J Dev Neurosci 23:143–152

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgments

We would like to thank the Infant Sibling Project staff, past and present, for their hard work in collecting these data. We are very grateful for Alexandra Libby’s assistance with data processing. Finally, we would like to acknowledge the very dedicated families who committed years of their lives to the Infant Sibling Project and who made this work possible. Funding was provided by NIH (R21DC08637) to H.T-F., NIDCD (1R01DC010290-01) to C.A.N. and H.T-F., the Simons Foundation (137186) to C.A.N. and the Autism Speaks Pilot Grants Program to H.T-F.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Laboratories of Cognitive Neuroscience, Division of Developmental Medicine, Children’s Hospital Boston, 1 Autumn St., 6th Fl, Boston, MA, 02215, USA

    Rhiannon J. Luyster, Jennifer B. Wagner, Vanessa Vogel-Farley & Charles A. Nelson III

  2. Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA

    Rhiannon J. Luyster, Jennifer B. Wagner & Charles A. Nelson III

  3. Department of Psychology, Boston University, 64 Cummington St., Boston, MA, 02215, USA

    Helen Tager-Flusberg

  4. Harvard Center on the Developing Child, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA

    Charles A. Nelson III

Authors
  1. Rhiannon J. Luyster
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Jennifer B. Wagner
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Vanessa Vogel-Farley
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Helen Tager-Flusberg
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  5. Charles A. Nelson III
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Rhiannon J. Luyster.

Additional information

This is one of several papers published together in Brain Topography on the ‘‘Special Issue: Brain Imaging across the Lifespan’’.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Luyster, R.J., Wagner, J.B., Vogel-Farley, V. et al. Neural Correlates of Familiar and Unfamiliar Face Processing in Infants at Risk for Autism Spectrum Disorders. Brain Topogr 24, 220–228 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10548-011-0176-z

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10548-011-0176-z

Keywords

Search

Navigation