BME News Highlights

Research Highlights

July 28, 2009

Shadmehr autism work featured in Nature Neuroscience

An article, "Representation of internal models of action in the autistic brain," summarizing work by Reza Shadmehr, members of his lab and colleagues, was published in the August 2009 issue of Nature Neuroscience.

The abstract states: "Children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) have deficits in motor control, imitation and social function. Does a dysfunction in the neural basis of representing internal models of action contribute to these problems? We measured patterns of generalization as children learned to control a novel tool and found that the autistic brain built a stronger than normal association between self-generated motor commands and proprioceptive feedback; furthermore, the greater the reliance on proprioception, the greater the child's impairments in social function and imitation."

Additional Information:

Abstract: Nature Neuroscience 12 970 - 972 (2009)

New Scientist: "Autism alters how kids sense motion"

UPI.com Health News: "Autism and poor visual motor skills linked"


 

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