Facial emotion recognition (FER) requires the integration of multi-dimensional information across various brain regions. Autistic individuals commonly experience difficulties in FER, a phenomenon often attributed to differences in brain connectivity. The nature of task-induced functional brain networks could provide insight into the neuromechanisms underlying FER difficulties in autism, however, to date, these mechanisms remain poorly understood.
In this study, the task induced functional brain networks of 19 autistic and 19 gender, age, and IQ matched non-autistic individuals were examined during a complex FER task. Electroencephalogram (EEG)-based functional brain networks were examined, including the investigation of differences in the time-varying whole-brain functional networks and the exploration of the task induced small-world properties.
The results showed statistically significant differences in the task-induced functional networks between autistic and non-autistic adults. Autistic adults compared to non-autistic adults showed a significant shift in the connectivity-based FER processing from the lower to the higher EEG frequency bands.
These findings may provide evidence at a neural level for the notion that autistic individuals have a preference for bottom-up lower-level processing, or alterations in top-down global processing, potentially contributing to the FER difficulties observed in this population. Results also suggest that functional brain networks in autism show significantly altered task-induced whole-brain small-world properties as compared to non-autistic individuals during complex FER. This study motivates further investigation of the underlying networks-basis of altered emotion processing in autism.