Performance on a single executive function (EF) task (e.g., a card sorting task) is often taken to represent ability on the underlying subcomponent of EF (e.g., set shifting) without accounting for the non-specific and non-executive skills employed to complete the task. This study used a manualised battery of EF tasks to derive individual task…

New, unsubstantiated therapies for individuals diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) that lack empirical support for their effectiveness seem to be introduced almost daily. These unproven therapies should be subjected to the methods of applied behavior analysis to experimentally evaluate their effectiveness. This study provides an…

Children with autism are characterized by milestones in joint attention (JA) skill. They fail to understand the directional cue issued by a partner (during social communication), which often results in them reciprocating inappropriately and not completing the JA bid successfully. The directional cues can be gaze-pointing, finger-pointing, etc.,…

Autism is frequently associated with difficulties with top-down attentional control, which impact on individuals' mental health and quality of life. The developmental processes involved in these attentional difficulties are not well understood. Using a data-driven approach, 2 samples (N = 294 and 412) of infants at elevated and typical likelihood…

The current study examined eye movement control in autistic (ASD) children. Simple targets were presented in isolation, or with central, parafoveal, or peripheral distractors synchronously. Sixteen children with ASD (47-81 months) and nineteen age and IQ matched typically developing children were instructed to look to the target as accurately and…

The current study investigated the extent cognitive and emotion regulation deficits (i.e., executive functions) associated with autism impact on the development of imagination in writing. Sixty-one children participated in the study (M age = 9 years 7 months, SD = 14 months, 18 female, 43 male), comprising a selected group with autism…

Although most researchers agree that individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) exhibit atypical attention, there is little consensus on the exact nature of their deficits. We explored whether attentional control in ASD varies as a function of motor proficiency. Nineteen children with ASD and 26 typically-developing controls completed the…

Self-report measures offer a unique source of information in the assessment and intervention of individuals with autism spectrum disorder. However, it is not known if children with autism spectrum disorder can answer self-report questionnaires accurately and consistently. As a step to address this issue, we examined validity indexes of the…

Interoceptive accuracy has been widely measured using the Heartbeat Tracking Test (HTT). We devised the novel paradigm of Interoception-Exteroception Synchronicity Judgement (IESJ) task to assess participants' interoceptive accuracy, exteroceptive accuracy, and the balancing score which reflected the ability to allocate attentions between…

Children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) have deficits in joint attention and play behaviors. We examined whether a robot-based play-drama intervention would promote these skills. Chinese-speaking preschool children were randomly assigned to an intervention group (N = 12) and a waitlist control group (N = 11). Children in the intervention…

Intervention research is increasingly conducted in community settings, however it is not clear how well practices are sustained locally or how children progress once external research support is removed. Two school-year cohorts of toddlers with autism (year 1: n = 55, year 2: n = 63) received Joint Attention, Symbolic Play, Engagement, and…

There is evidence that autistic children may have reduced executive function skills, contributing to day-to-day difficulties, but much remains unknown regarding the influence of bilingualism. We investigated its influence on sustained attention, interference control, flexible switching and working memory, in Arabic-English autistic (n = 27)…

Analogical reasoning was investigated among children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) without intellectual disabilities and typical development (TD). Children were asked to select one of two targets in two conditions: (1) with and without spatial structure similarity; (2) with and without a perceptual distractor. Results demonstrate that…

Sensory processing difficulties affect the development of sensorimotor skills in individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). However, the effect of sensory information on postural control is unclear in the ASD adult population. The present study examined the effect of visual information on postural control as well as the attentional demands…

We directly assessed the broader aspects of sociability (social enjoyment, social motivation, social interaction skills and social discomfort) in individuals with Cornelia de Lange (CdLS), fragile X (FXS) and Rubinstein-Taybi syndromes (RTS), and their association with autism characteristics and chronological age in these groups. Individuals with…