IMR Press / JIN / Volume 22 / Issue 5 / DOI: 10.31083/j.jin2205112
Open Access Original Research
The Levels of Auditory Processing during Emotional Perception in Children with Autism
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1 Laboratory of Human Higher Nervous Activity, Institute of Higher Nervous Activity and Neurophysiology of Russian Academy of Science, 117485 Moscow, Russian Federation
2 Laboratory for the Study of Tactile Communication, Pushkin State Russian Language Institute, 117485 Moscow, Russian Federation
3 Laboratory for Neurocognitive Research, Our Sunny World Center for Children with Autism, 109052 Moscow, Russian Federation
4 Laboratory of Physiology of Sensory Systems, Institute of Higher Nervous Activity and Neurophysiology of Russian Academy of Science, 117485 Moscow, Russian Federation
*Correspondence: caviter@list.ru (Galina V. Portnova)
J. Integr. Neurosci. 2023, 22(5), 112; https://doi.org/10.31083/j.jin2205112
Submitted: 11 March 2023 | Revised: 20 May 2023 | Accepted: 29 May 2023 | Published: 9 August 2023
Copyright: © 2023 The Author(s). Published by IMR Press.
This is an open access article under the CC BY 4.0 license.
Abstract

Background: The perception of basic emotional sounds, such as crying and laughter is associated with effective interpersonal communication. Difficulties with the perception and analysis of sounds that complicate understanding emotions at an early development age may contribute to communication deficits. Methods: This study focused on auditory nonverbal emotional perception including emotional vocalizations with opposite valences (crying and laughter) and neutral sound (phoneme “Pᴂ”). We conducted event-related potential analysis and compared peak alpha frequencies (PAFs) for different conditions in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and typically developing (TD) children aged 4 to 6 years old (N = 25 for each group). Results: Children with ASD had a higher amplitude of P100 and lower amplitude of N200 for all types of sounds and higher P270 in response to neutral phoneme. During the perception of emotional sounds, children with ASD demonstrated a single P270 electroencephalography (EEG) component instead of a P200–P300 complex specific to TD children. However, the most significant differences were associated with a response to emotional valences of stimuli. The EEG differences between crying and laughter were expressed as a lower amplitude of N400 and higher PAF for crying compared to laughter and were found only in TD children. Conclusions: Children with ASD have shown not just abnormal acoustical perception but altered emotional analysis of affective sounds as well.

Keywords
electroencephalography (EEG)
crying
laughter
phoneme
peak alpha frequency
event-related potential (ERP)
N400
late positivity (LP)
P270
Funding
22-15-00324/Russian Science Foundation
Figures
Fig. 1.
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