A recent theory posits that prediction deficits may underlie the core symptoms in autism spectrum disorder (ASD). However, empirical evidence for this hypothesis is minimal. Using a visual extrapolation task, we tested motion-prediction abilities in children and adolescents with and without ASD. We examined the factors known to be important for motion prediction: the central-tendency response bias and smooth-pursuit eye movements. In participants with ASD, response biases followed an atypical trajectory that was dominated by early responses. This differed from control participants, who exhibited response biases that reflected a gradual accumulation of knowledge about stimulus statistics. Moreover, although better smooth-pursuit eye movements for the moving object were linked to more accurate motion prediction in control participants, in participants with ASD, better smooth pursuit was counterintuitively linked to a more pronounced early-response bias. Together, these results demonstrate atypical visual prediction abilities in people with ASD and offer insights into possible mechanisms underlying the observed differences.

最近的一个理论认为，预测缺陷可能是自闭症谱系障碍 (ASD) 核心症状的基础。然而，这一假设的经验证据很少。我们使用视觉外推任务测试了患有和不患有 ASD 的儿童和青少年的运动预测能力。我们检查了已知对运动预测很重要的因素：中心趋势响应偏差和平滑追踪眼球运动。在患有 ASD 的参与者中，反应偏差遵循以早期反应为主的非典型轨迹。这与对照组参与者不同，后者表现出反应偏见，反映了有关刺激统计知识的逐渐积累。此外，虽然更好地平滑追踪移动物体的眼球运动与控制参与者更准确的运动预测有关，在患有 ASD 的参与者中，更好的平稳追求与更明显的早期反应偏差有悖常理。总之，这些结果证明了 ASD 患者的非典型视觉预测能力，并提供了对观察到的差异背后可能机制的见解。