TY - JOUR

T1 - Evidence that non-social autism traits in the general population are correlated with spatial processing of biological motion

AU - Cracco, Emiel

AU - Oomen, Danna

AU - Wiersema, Jan R.

PY - 2025

Y1 - 2025

N2 - Biological motion perception theories of autism hold that differences in how biological motion is processed help explain the social difficulties experienced by individuals with autism. However, evidence for this theory is mixed, with some studies finding such differences, but others not. Recent meta-analytical work suggests that autism may be specifically associated with differences in the temporal processing of biological motion. In the current study, we correlated autism traits in the general population (N = 193) with performance on a biological motion perception task while manipulating both spatial and temporal stimulus properties by means of spatial and temporal scrambling. In contrast to our hypothesis, we found no correlation between the effect of temporal scrambling and autism traits (operationalized as AQ scores). We did, however, find a correlation between the subscale attention to detail and the effect of spatial scrambling. This suggests that autism-related differences in local-global processing are associated with the degree to which spatial information is used to bind local motion signals in a global movement percept. However, correlations were small and further research will be needed to confirm this finding.

AB - Biological motion perception theories of autism hold that differences in how biological motion is processed help explain the social difficulties experienced by individuals with autism. However, evidence for this theory is mixed, with some studies finding such differences, but others not. Recent meta-analytical work suggests that autism may be specifically associated with differences in the temporal processing of biological motion. In the current study, we correlated autism traits in the general population (N = 193) with performance on a biological motion perception task while manipulating both spatial and temporal stimulus properties by means of spatial and temporal scrambling. In contrast to our hypothesis, we found no correlation between the effect of temporal scrambling and autism traits (operationalized as AQ scores). We did, however, find a correlation between the subscale attention to detail and the effect of spatial scrambling. This suggests that autism-related differences in local-global processing are associated with the degree to which spatial information is used to bind local motion signals in a global movement percept. However, correlations were small and further research will be needed to confirm this finding.

U2 - 10.1080/13506285.2025.2588232

DO - 10.1080/13506285.2025.2588232

M3 - Journal articles

SP - 1

EP - 8

JO - Visual Cognition

JF - Visual Cognition

SN - 1350-6285

ER -