Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Interpersonal Synchrony in Autism

  • Autism Spectrum Disorders (ES Brodkin, Section Editor)
  • Published:
Current Psychiatry Reports Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Purpose of Review

We review evidence for the presence, quality, and correlates of interpersonal synchrony in autism spectrum disorder (ASD) across four domains: motor, conversational, physiological, and neural. We also propose cognitive and neural mechanisms for the disruption of interpersonal synchrony and investigate synchrony as a mechanism of intervention in ASD.

Recent Findings

Across domains, synchrony is present but reduced or atypical in individuals with ASD during interactions with individuals with typical development (TD). Atypical synchrony may reflect the contribution of both intrapersonal mechanisms, such as atypical motor timing, and interpersonal mechanisms, such as atypical interindividual coupling. Research suggests evidence for synchrony interventions leading to improvements in some aspects of social behavior.

Summary

Understanding synchrony in ASD has the potential to lead to biomarkers and interventions to support social functioning. However, further research should clarify mechanisms of atypical synchrony in ASD including taking features of the dyad into account.

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

Similar content being viewed by others

References

Papers of particular interest, published recently, have been highlighted as: • Of importance

  1. Richardson MJ, Marsh KL, Isenhower RW, Goodman JRL, Schmidt RC. Rocking together: dynamics of intentional and unintentional interpersonal coordination. Hum Mov Sci. 2007;26:867–91. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.humov.2007.07.002.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  2. Louwerse MM, Dale R, Bard EG, Jeuniaux P. Behavior matching in multimodal communication is synchronized. Cogn Sci. 2012;36:1404–26. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1551-6709.2012.01269.x.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  3. Feldman R, Magori-Cohen R, Galili G, Singer M, Louzoun Y. Mother and infant coordinate heart rhythms through episodes of interaction synchrony. Infant Behav Dev. 2011;34:569–77. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.infbeh.2011.06.008.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  4. Vicaria IM, Dickens L. Meta-analyses of the intra- and interpersonal outcomes of interpersonal coordination. J Nonverbal Behav. 2016;40:335–61. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10919-016-0238-8.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  5. Rennung M, Göritz AS. Prosocial consequences of interpersonal synchrony: a meta-analysis. Z Psychol. 2016;224:168–89. https://doi.org/10.1027/2151-2604/a000252.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  6. Mogan R, Fischer R, Bulbulia JA. To be in synchrony or not? A meta-analysis of synchrony’s effects on behavior, perception, cognition and affect. J Exp Soc Psychol. 2017;72:13–20. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jesp.2017.03.009.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  7. Cirelli LK. How interpersonal synchrony facilitates early prosocial behavior. Curr Opin Psychol. 2018;20:35–9. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.copsyc.2017.08.009.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  8. • Wadge H, Brewer R, Bird G, Toni I, Stolk A. Communicative misalignment in autism spectrum disorder. Cortex. 2019;115:15–26. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cortex.2019.01.003. This study employs a novel game to examine how communicative alignment occurs in ASD outside of the demands of face-to-face interaction. There is evidence for reduced alignment in ASD-ASD and ASD-TD dyads relative to TD-TD dyads. This reduced alignment correlates with poorer game performance for all groups.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  9. Feldman R. Parent-infant synchrony: a biobehavioral model of mutual influences in the formation of affiliative bonds. Monogr Soc Res Child Dev. 2012;77:42–51. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-5834.2011.00660.x.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  10. Dikker S, Wan L, Davidesco I, Kaggen L, Oostrik M, McClintock J, et al. Brain-to-brain synchrony tracks real-world dynamic group interactions in the classroom. Curr Biol. 2017;27:1375–80. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2017.04.002.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  11. Palumbo RV, Marraccini ME, Weyandt LL, Wilder-Smith O, McGee HA, Liu S, et al. Interpersonal autonomic physiology: a systematic review of the literature. Personal Soc Psychol Rev. 2017;21:99–141. https://doi.org/10.1177/1088868316628405.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  12. • Bloch C, Vogeley K, Georgescu AL, Falter-Wagner CM. INTRApersonal synchrony as constituent of INTERpersonal synchrony and its relevance for autism spectrum disorder. Front Robot AI. 2019;6:73. https://doi.org/10.3389/frobt.2019.00073. This review summarizes current papers on interpersonal synchrony in ASD and proposes that atypical intrapersonal timing may give rise to atypical interpersonal timing.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  13. Peper C(L)E, van der Wal SJ, Begeer S. Autism in action: reduced bodily connectedness during social interactions? Front Psychol. 2016;7:1862. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2016.01862.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  14. Tordjman S, Davlantis KS, Georgieff N, Geoffray M-M, Speranza M, Anderson GM, et al. Autism as a disorder of biological and behavioral rhythms: toward new therapeutic perspectives. Front Pediatr. 2015;3:1. https://doi.org/10.3389/fped.2015.00001.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  15. • Shamay-Tsoory SG, Saporta N, Marton-Alper IZ, Gvirts HZ. Herding brains: a core neural mechanism for social alignment. Trends Cogn Sci. 2019;23:174–86. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tics.2019.01.002. This paper proposes a common neural mechanism for alignment across the motor, cognitive, and emotional domains, with some evidence for how this model may apply in ASD.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  16. Brezis R-S, Noy L, Alony T, Gotlieb R, Cohen R, Golland Y, et al. Patterns of joint improvisation in adults with autism spectrum disorder. Front Psychol. 2017;8:1790. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2017.01790.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  17. Delaherche E, Chetouani M, Bigouret F, Xavier J, Plaza M, Cohen D. Assessment of the communicative and coordination skills of children with autism spectrum disorders and typically developing children using social signal processing. Res Autism Spectr Disord. 2013;7:741–56. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rasd.2013.02.003.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  18. Fitzpatrick P, Frazier JA, Cochran DM, Mitchell T, Coleman C, Schmidt RC. Impairments of social motor synchrony evident in autism spectrum disorder. Front Psychol. 2016;7:1323. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2016.01323.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  19. • Fitzpatrick P, Romero V, Amaral JL, Duncan A, Barnard H, Richardson MJ, et al. Evaluating the importance of social motor synchronization and motor skill for understanding autism. Autism Res. 2017;10:1687–99. https://doi.org/10.1002/aur.1808. This study examines a variety of motor synchrony tasks in a large sample of children, finding evidence for less stable motor synchrony in ASD.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  20. Kaur M, Srinivasan SM, Bhat AN. Comparing motor performance, praxis, coordination, and interpersonal synchrony between children with and without autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Res Dev Disabil. 2018;72:79–95. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ridd.2017.10.025.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  21. Kawasaki M, Kitajo K, Fukao K, Murai T, Yamaguchi Y, Funabiki Y. Frontal theta activation during motor synchronization in autism. Sci Rep. 2017;7:15034. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-017-14508-4.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  22. Koehne S, Hatri A, Cacioppo JT, Dziobek I. Perceived interpersonal synchrony increases empathy: insights from autism spectrum disorder. Cognition. 2016;146:8–15. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cognition.2015.09.007.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  23. Marsh KL, Isenhower RW, Richardson MJ, Helt M, Verbalis AD, Schmidt RC, et al. Autism and social disconnection in interpersonal rocking. Front Integr Neurosci. 2013;7:4. https://doi.org/10.3389/fnint.2013.00004.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  24. • Noel J-P, De Niear MA, Lazzara NS, Wallace MT. Uncoupling between multisensory temporal function and nonverbal turn-taking in autism spectrum disorder. IEEE Trans Cogn Dev Syst. 2018;10:973–82. https://doi.org/10.1109/TCDS.2017.2778141. This study highlights the feasibility of exploring motor synchrony in ASD via video motion analysis. Children with ASD synchronize their head and hand movements less with a clinician than children with TD, with potential relationships to children’s perception of audiovisual synchrony.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  25. Romero V, Fitzpatrick P, Schmidt RC, Richardson MJ. Using cross-recurrence quantification analysis to understand social motor coordination in children with autism spectrum disorder. In: Webber Jr CL, Ioana C, Marwan N, editors. Recurrence plots their quantif expand horizons. Berlin: Springer; 2016.

    Google Scholar 

  26. Romero V, Fitzpatrick P, Roulier S, Duncan A, Richardson MJ, Schmidt RC. Evidence of embodied social competence during conversation in high functioning children with autism spectrum disorder. PLoS One. 2018;13:e0193906. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0193906.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  27. Stoit AMB, van Schie HT, Riem M, Meulenbroek RGJ, Newman-Norlund RD, Slaats-Willemse DIE, et al. Internal model deficits impair joint action in children and adolescents with autism spectrum disorders. Res Autism Spectr Disord. 2011;5:1526–37. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rasd.2011.02.016.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  28. Zapata-Fonseca L, Dotov D, Fossion R, Froese T, Schilbach L, Vogeley K, et al. Multi-scale coordination of distinctive movement patterns during embodied interaction between adults with high-functioning autism and neurotypicals. Front Psychol. 2019;9:2760. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.02760.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  29. Allen ML, Haywood S, Rajendran G, Branigan H. Evidence for syntactic alignment in children with autism. Dev Sci. 2011;14:540–8. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-7687.2010.01001.x.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  30. Branigan HP, Tosi A, Gillespie-Smith K. Spontaneous lexical alignment in children with an autistic spectrum disorder and their typically developing peers. J Exp Psychol Learn Mem Cogn. 2016;42:1821–31. https://doi.org/10.1037/xlm0000272.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  31. Hobson RP, Hobson JA, García-Pérez R, Du Bois J. Dialogic linkage and resonance in autism. J Autism Dev Disord. 2012;42:2718–28. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-012-1528-6.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  32. Hopkins Z, Yuill N, Keller B. Children with autism align syntax in natural conversation. Appl Psycholinguist. 2016;37:347–70. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0142716414000599.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  33. Nadig A, Seth S, Sasson M. Global similarities and multifaceted differences in the production of partner-specific referential pacts by adults with autism spectrum disorders. Front Psychol. 2015;6:1888. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.01888.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  34. Slocombe KE, Alvarez I, Branigan HP, Jellema T, Burnett HG, Fischer A, et al. Linguistic alignment in adults with and without Asperger’s syndrome. J Autism Dev Disord. 2013;43:1423–36. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-012-1698-2.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  35. Baker JK, Fenning RM, Howland MA, Baucom BR, Moffitt J, Erath SA. Brief report: a pilot study of parent–child biobehavioral synchrony in autism spectrum disorder. J Autism Dev Disord. 2015;45:4140–6. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-015-2528-0.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  36. Dunsmore JC, Ashley RA, Zhou Y, Swain DM, Factor RS, Broomell AP, et al. Marching to the beat of your own drum?: a proof-of-concept study assessing physiological linkage in autism spectrum disorder. Biol Psychol. 2019;144:37–45. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biopsycho.2019.03.001.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  37. Saxbe DE, Golan O, Ostfeld-Etzion S, Hirschler-Guttenberg Y, Zagoory-Sharon O, Feldman R. HPA axis linkage in parent–child dyads: effects of parent sex, autism spectrum diagnosis, and dyadic relationship behavior. Dev Psychobiol. 2017;59:776–86. https://doi.org/10.1002/dev.21537.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  38. Hasegawa C, Ikeda T, Yoshimura Y, Hiraishi H, Takahashi T, Furutani N, et al. Mu rhythm suppression reflects mother-child face-to-face interactions: a pilot study with simultaneous MEG recording. Sci Rep. 2016;6:34977. https://doi.org/10.1038/srep34977.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  39. Tanabe HC, Kosaka H, Saito DN, Koike T, Hayashi MJ, Izuma K, et al. Hard to “tune in”: neural mechanisms of live face-to-face interaction with high-functioning autistic spectrum disorder. Front Hum Neurosci. 2012;6:268. https://doi.org/10.3389/fnhum.2012.00268.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  40. Ward JA, Richardson D, Orgs G, Hunter K, Hamilton A. Sensing interpersonal synchrony between actors and autistic children in theatre using wrist-worn accelerometers. Proc 2018 ACM Int Symp Wearable Comput 2018.

  41. Lampi A, Fitzpatrick P, Romero V, Amaral J, Schmidt RC. Understanding the influence of social and motor context on the co-occurring frequency of restricted and repetitive behaviors in autism. J Autism Dev Disord. 2018:1–18. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-018-3698-3.

  42. Fitzpatrick P, Diorio R, Richardson MJ, Schmidt RC. Dynamical methods for evaluating the time-dependent unfolding of social coordination in children with autism. Front Integr Neurosci. 2013;7:21. https://doi.org/10.3389/fnint.2013.00021.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  43. Fitzpatrick P, Romero V, Amaral JL, Duncan A, Barnard H, Richardson MJ, et al. Social motor synchronization: insights for understanding social behavior in autism. J Autism Dev Disord. 2017;47:2092–107. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-017-3124-2.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  44. Fitzpatrick P, Frazier JA, Cochran D, Mitchell T, Coleman C, Schmidt RC. Relationship between theory of mind, emotion recognition, and social synchrony in adolescents with and without autism. Front Psychol. 2018;9:1337. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.01337.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  45. Du Bois JW, Hobson RP, Hobson JA. Dialogic resonance and intersubjective engagement in autism. Cogn Linguist. 2014;25:411–41. https://doi.org/10.1515/cog-2014-0025.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  46. Bottema-Beutel K. Glimpses into the blind spot: social interaction and autism. J Commun Disord. 2017;68:24–34. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jcomdis.2017.06.008.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  47. Davis M, West K, Bilms J, Morelen D, Suveg C. A systematic review of parent–child synchrony: it is more than skin deep. Dev Psychobiol. 2018;60:674–91. https://doi.org/10.1002/dev.21743.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  48. Fox NA, Bakermans-Kranenburg MJ, Yoo KH, Bowman LC, Cannon EN, Vanderwert RE, et al. Assessing human mirror activity with EEG mu rhythm: a meta-analysis. Psychol Bull. 2016;142:291–313. https://doi.org/10.1037/bul0000031.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  49. Rolison MJ, Naples AJ, McPartland JC. Interactive social neuroscience to study autism spectrum disorder. Yale J Biol Med. 2015;88:17–24.

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  50. Cook J. From movement kinematics to social cognition: the case of autism. Phil Trans R Soc B. 2016;371:20150372. https://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2015.0372.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  51. • Bolis D, Balsters J, Wenderoth N, Becchio C, Schilbach L. Beyond autism: introducing the dialectical misattunement hypothesis and a bayesian account of intersubjectivity. Psychopathology. 2017;50:355–72. https://doi.org/10.1159/000484353. This article proposes the dialectical misattunement hypothesis, which highlights the role of interpersonal mismatch in determining social outcomes. Under this hypothesis, dyads comprised of individuals with the same diagnosis would be expected to align better than dyads comprised of mismatched diagnoses.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  52. Bolis D, Schilbach L. Observing and participating in social interactions: action perception and action control across the autistic spectrum. Dev Cogn Neurosci. 2018;29:168–75. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.dcn.2017.01.009.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  53. Bhat AN, Landa RJ, Galloway JC. Current perspectives on motor functioning in infants, children, and adults with autism spectrum disorders. Phys Ther. 2011;91:1116–29. https://doi.org/10.2522/ptj.20100294.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  54. Gowen E, Hamilton A. Motor abilities in autism: a review using a computational context. J Autism Dev Disord. 2013;43:323–44. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-012-1574-0.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  55. Frazier TW, Strauss M, Klingemier EW, Zetzer EE, Hardan AY, Eng C, et al. A meta-analysis of gaze differences to social and nonsocial information between individuals with and without autism. J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry. 2017;56:546–55. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jaac.2017.05.005.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  56. Chevallier C, Parish-Morris J, McVey A, Rump KM, Sasson NJ, Herrington JD, et al. Measuring social attention and motivation in autism spectrum disorder using eye-tracking: stimulus type matters. Autism Res. 2015;8:620–8. https://doi.org/10.1002/aur.1479.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  57. Kinsbourne M, Helt M. Entrainment, mimicry, and interpersonal synchrony. In: Fein D, editor. The neuropsychology of autism. New York: Oxford University Press; 2011.

    Google Scholar 

  58. Vivanti G, Trembath D, Dissanayake C. Mechanisms of imitation impairment in autism spectrum disorder. J Abnorm Child Psychol. 2014;42:1395–405. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10802-014-9874-9.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  59. Chevallier C, Kohls G, Troiani V, Brodkin ES, Schultz RT. The social motivation theory of autism. Trends Cogn Sci. 2012;16:231–9. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tics.2012.02.007.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  60. Clements CC, Zoltowski AR, Yankowitz LD, Yerys BE, Schultz RT, Herrington JD. Evaluation of the social motivation hypothesis of autism: a systematic review and meta-analysis. JAMA Psychiatry. 2018;75:797–808. https://doi.org/10.1001/jamapsychiatry.2018.1100.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  61. Feldman R, Golan O, Hirschler-Guttenberg Y, Ostfeld-Etzion S, Zagoory-Sharon O. Parent-child interaction and oxytocin production in pre-schoolers with autism spectrum disorder. Br J Psychiatry. 2014;205:107–12. https://doi.org/10.1192/bjp.bp.113.137513.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  62. Parker KJ, Garner JP, Libove RA, Hyde SA, Hornbeak KB, Carson DS, et al. Plasma oxytocin concentrations and OXTR polymorphisms predict social impairments in children with and without autism spectrum disorder. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2014;111:12258–63. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1402236111.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  63. Festante F, Ferrari PF, Thorpe SG, Buchanan RW, Fox NA. Intranasal oxytocin enhances EEG mu rhythm desynchronization during execution and observation of social action: an exploratory study. Psychoneuroendocrinology. 2020;111:104467. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.psyneuen.2019.104467.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  64. Levy J, Goldstein A, Zagoory-Sharon O, Weisman O, Schneiderman I, Eidelman-Rothman M, et al. Oxytocin selectively modulates brain response to stimuli probing social synchrony. Neuroimage. 2016;124:923–30. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuroimage.2015.09.066.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  65. Mu Y, Guo C, Han S. Oxytocin enhances inter-brain synchrony during social coordination in male adults. Soc Cogn Affect Neurosci. 2016;11:1882–93. https://doi.org/10.1093/scan/nsw106.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  66. Arueti M, Perach-Barzilay N, Tsoory MM, Berger B, Getter N, Shamay-Tsoory SG. When two become one: the role of oxytocin in interpersonal coordination and cooperation. J Cogn Neurosci. 2013;25:1418–27. https://doi.org/10.1162/jocn_a_00400.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  67. Spengler FB, Scheele D, Marsh N, Kofferath C, Flach A, Schwarz S, et al. Oxytocin facilitates reciprocity in social communication. Soc Cogn Affect Neurosci. 2017;12:1325–33. https://doi.org/10.1093/scan/nsx061.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  68. Rizzolatti G, Craighero L. The mirror-neuron system. Annu Rev Neurosci. 2004;27:169–92. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.neuro.27.070203.144230.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  69. Oberman LM, Ramachandran VS. The simulating social mind: the role of the mirror neuron system and simulation in the social and communicative deficits of autism spectrum disorders. Psychol Bull. 2007;133:310–27. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-2909.133.2.310.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  70. Iacoboni M, Dapretto M. The mirror neuron system and the consequences of its dysfunction. Nat Rev Neurosci. 2006;7:942–51. https://doi.org/10.1038/nrn2024.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  71. Hamilton AF de C. Reflecting on the mirror neuron system in autism: a systematic review of current theories. Dev Cogn Neurosci. 2013;3:91–105. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.dcn.2012.09.008.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  72. Hamilton AF de C. Emulation and mimicry for social interaction: a theoretical approach to imitation in autism. Q J Exp Psychol. 2008;61:101–15. https://doi.org/10.1080/17470210701508798.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  73. Forbes PAG, Wang Y, Hamilton AF de C. STORMy interactions: gaze and the modulation of mimicry in adults on the autism spectrum. Psychon Bull Rev. 2017;24:529–35. https://doi.org/10.3758/s13423-016-1136-0.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  74. Wang Y, Hamilton AF de C. Social top-down response modulation (STORM): a model of the control of mimicry in social interaction. Front Hum Neurosci. 2012;6:153. https://doi.org/10.3389/fnhum.2012.00153.

  75. Kavanagh LC, Suhler CL, Churchland PS, Winkielman P. When it’s an error to mirror: the surprising reputational costs of mimicry. Psychol Sci. 2011;22:1274–6. https://doi.org/10.1177/0956797611418678.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  76. Clark A. Whatever next? Predictive brains, situated agents, and the future of cognitive science. Behav Brain Sci. 2013;36:181–204. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0140525X12000477.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  77. Friston K. The free-energy principle: a unified brain theory? Nat Rev Neurosci. 2010;11:127–38. https://doi.org/10.1038/nrn2787.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  78. Sinha P, Kjelgaard MM, Gandhi TK, Tsourides K, Cardinaux AL, Pantazis D, et al. Autism as a disorder of prediction. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2014;111:15220–5. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1416797111.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  79. von der Lühe T, Manera V, Barisic I, Becchio C, Vogeley K, Schilbach L. Interpersonal predictive coding, not action perception, is impaired in autism. Philos Trans R Soc B Biol Sci. 2016;371:20150373. https://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2015.0373.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  80. Holper L, Scholkmann F, Wolf M. Between-brain connectivity during imitation measured by fNIRS. Neuroimage. 2012;63:212–22. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuroimage.2012.06.028.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  81. Siller M, Sigman M. The behaviors of parents of children with autism predict the subsequent development of their children’s communication. J Autism Dev Disord. 2002;32:77–89. https://doi.org/10.1023/a:1014884404276.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  82. Koehne S, Behrends A, Fairhurst MT, Dziobek I. Fostering social cognition through an imitation- and synchronization-based dance/movement intervention in adults with autism spectrum disorder: a controlled proof-of-concept study. Psychother Psychosom. 2016;85:27–35. https://doi.org/10.1159/000441111.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  83. Landa RJ, Holman KC, O’Neill AH, Stuart EA. Intervention targeting development of socially synchronous engagement in toddlers with autism spectrum disorder: a randomized controlled trial. J Child Psychol Psychiatry. 2011;52:13–21. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1469-7610.2010.02288.x.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  84. Srinivasan SM, Kaur M, Park IK, Gifford TD, Marsh KL, Bhat AN. The effects of rhythm and robotic interventions on the imitation/praxis, interpersonal synchrony, and motor performance of children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD): a pilot randomized controlled trial. Autism Res Treat. 2015;2015:736516. https://doi.org/10.1155/2015/736516.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  85. Heasman B, Gillespie A. Neurodivergent intersubjectivity: distinctive features of how autistic people create shared understanding. Autism. 2019;23:910–21. https://doi.org/10.1177/1362361318785172.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Download references

Funding

Contributions to this article from Elizabeth Redcay and Kathryn A. McNaughton were supported in part by funding from the National Institutes of Mental Health (R01MH107441).

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Neuroscience and Cognitive Science Program, University of Maryland, College Park, USA

    Kathryn A. McNaughton & Elizabeth Redcay

  2. Department of Psychology, University of Maryland, 2147D Biology-Psychology Building, College Park, MD, 20742, USA

    Elizabeth Redcay

Authors
  1. Kathryn A. McNaughton
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Elizabeth Redcay
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Elizabeth Redcay.

Ethics declarations

Conflict of Interest

The authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest.

Human and Animal Rights and Informed Consent

This article does not contain any studies with human or animal subjects performed by any of the authors.

Additional information

Publisher’s Note

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

This article is part of the Topical Collection on Autism Spectrum Disorders

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

McNaughton, K.A., Redcay, E. Interpersonal Synchrony in Autism. Curr Psychiatry Rep 22, 12 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11920-020-1135-8

Download citation

  • Published:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11920-020-1135-8

Keywords

Search

Navigation