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Hearing one’s name in autism spectrum
disorder: a preliminary fMRI investigation
Submission Number:
2409
Submission Type:
Abstract Submission
Authors:
Sabine Huemer1, Frithjof Kruggel2, Virginia Mann2, Jena-G. Gehricke2, Jean-G.
Gehricke2
Institutions:
1Loyola Marymount University, Los Angeles, CA, 2University of California, Irvine, CA
Introduction:
The present fMRI experiment compares brain activity of adolescents with Autism
Spectrum Disorders (ASD) to those of typically developing adolescents as they listen to
their own first names, familiar people's names, numbers, and names objects of high
interest. To our knowledge, there has only been one imaging study so far that
investigated hearing one's name in ASD in an fMRI study with a 4-year-old child with
autism (Carmody et al., 2007). The girl was sedated while listening to numbers, 'hello',
and her own first name. The greatest volume of overall activation was recorded in
response to numbers.
Methods:
9 participants with ASD and 9 controls, ages 12 – 20 yrs., were enrolled, the diagnosis
confirmed, and the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test (PPVT-III), a test for verbal ability,
administered. Subjects passively listen the stimuli. During each session, the subject's
first name was heard a total of 5 times, each of the other stimuli categories was
represented by 5 different nouns, which each were heard once. The same set of stimuli
was presented in different order two more times for a total of 60 stimuli per subject (1
s/stimulus, 3 s interstimulus interval of 3 seconds).
T1-weighted MR images were acquired on a Philips Achieva 3T scanner, using a TFE
sequence with TR 11 ms, TE 3.7 ms, flip angle 18 degrees, 150 sagittal slices with a
matrix of 240 x 240 voxels, corresponding to an isotropic resolution of 1.0 mm. T2-
weighted images were acquired using a single-shot EPI protocol with: TR = 2000 ms,
TE = 30 ms, flip angle = 75 degrees, 30 axial slices (3 mm slice thickness and 1 mm
gap) with a matrix of 128 x 128 voxels, corresponding to an inplane resolution of 1.8
mm. During each of the three functional imaging sequences, 110 volumes were taken.
spm software was used to look at group differences in the different conditions, p < 0.05
and p < 0.1.
Results:
When hearing their own name, the ASD group showed overall less areas of activation
and they relied more heavily on prefrontal structures (especially the frontal pole, BA 10)
as compared to controls. This supports the findings from Carmody et al., 2007.
Interestingly, we also found activity in the left thalamus in the group that scored lower on
the verbal ability measure, the PPVT.
When hearing their own name, controls and the individuals who scored higher on the
verbal ability measure, the PPVT, (HS group) showed activation in areas of self-
referential processing and areas associated with hearing one's name (including BA 7,
BA 9, BA 13, BA 17, BA 22, BA 31, BA 19). Also notable was a reliance on more
anterior regions in the ASD and the lower-scoring (LS group) vs. the more posterior
activation in the control and HS groups. Interestingly, we found an involvement of the
right hippocampus (BA 53) in the HS group.
Conclusions:
Overall, our results showed that, when listening to our highly self-referential stimuli, the
neurotypical adolescents relied more on brain regions associated with self-recognition
that were expected to be activated when hearing their own name and stimuli of high
self-referential value. Adolescents with an ASD, on the other hand, relied on frontal-
occipital areas linked to visual memory recognition and episodic memory.
We infer that adolescents with ASD, especially those with lower verbal abilities, may
"remember" their own name like they remember another familiar person's name, a
desirable familiar object, or a number but they may not implicitly "know" self-referent
words as distinct from other words.
Disorders of the Nervous System:
Autism 1
Imaging Methods:
BOLD fMRI 2
Social Neuroscience:
Self Processes
Keywords:
Autism
Development
FUNCTIONAL MRI
Psychiatric Disorders
1|2Indicates the priority used for review
Would you accept an oral presentation if your abstract is selected for an oral
session?
Yes
I would be willing to discuss my abstract with members of the press should my
abstract be marked newsworthy:
Yes
Please indicate below if your study was a "resting state" or "task-activation”
study.
Task-activation
Healthy subjects only or patients (note that patient studies may also involve
healthy subjects):
Patients
Internal Review Board (IRB) or Animal Use and Care Committee (AUCC) Approval.
Please indicate approval below. Please note: Failure to have IRB or AUCC
approval, if applicable will lead to automatic rejection of abstract.
Yes, I have IRB or AUCC approval
Please indicate which methods were used in your research:
Functional MRI
For human MRI, what field strength scanner do you use?
3.0T
Which processing packages did you use for your study?
SPM
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