DISCUSSION 4. Subcortical Affective Processing
4.3 Task Attention
One caveat of this study is the ability to monitor non-conscious emotional stimuli responses in the ASD group and relies on the attention to the task at hand. In most studies, an emotion recognition-oriented task has been used, which raises the concern of
‘high road’ cognitive interferences with the underlying visual stimuli response. While statistically significant differences were found for increased response times and lowered accuracy in the ASD group, the results are not considered substantial. The 66 msec lag in response time for the ASD group is insignificant compared to the 1800 msec time slot allotted to respond. Similarly, the 6% decrement in accuracy does not warrant concern of an attention deficit, although it corresponds with the 6% less activation found in the left pulvinar, which has been shown to be involved in attention and responds to consciously-perceived stimuli (Pessoa & Adolphs, 2010); however, no significant correlations were found between the pulvinar and accuracy measurements. The areas found to correlate with task-related behavioral measurements in the ASD group were the left pSTS, the aSTG, and the amygdala. All interactions were found for fearful stimuli, and notably, an
increase in amygdala response was shown to correspond with an increase in accurate responses. This finding does raise concerns since it could be argued that more attentive participants displayed higher amygdala activation; however, accuracy was at 81% for fearful stimuli and for neutral stimuli.
4.4 Limitations
Many steps can be taken in the future to better present the differences of face processing circuitry in ASD individuals. Firstly, most of the masks used in creating regions of interest were administered after mapping an individual’s brain to standard space. A more precise method would be to mask each individual’s region of interest before mapping to standard space, in order to obtain the most accurate response data pertaining to that particular region. In addition, this method would further allow the investigation of smaller areas like the superior colliculus and proximal nuclei of the pulvinar, which are far too small and too variable to rely on correct mapping. Secondly, connectivity data would be necessary to support the functional correlations specified above. While one area may respond in sync with another, proof that neuronal connections exist or do not exist would further solidify these conclusions. Lastly, the study lacks in statistical power due to the low number of participants and the high number of
comparisons needed to peel apart such a complex problem. With so much variability among individuals in the brain areas being studied, a large number of participants are necessary to reduce the standard error significantly.
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Curriculum Vitae
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