Social deficits in autism spectrum disorder (ASD) have been linked to atypical activation of the mentalizing network. This work, however, has been limited by a focus on the brain activity of a single person during computerized social tasks rather than exploring brain activity during in vivo interactions. The current study assessed neural synchronization during a conversation as a mechanism for social impairment in adults with ASD (n = 24) and matched controls (n = 26). Functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) data were collected from the prefrontal cortex (PFC) and tempoparietal junction (TPJ). Participants self-reported on their social communication and videos of the interaction were coded for utterances and conversational turns. As expected, controls showed more neural synchrony than participants with ASD in the TPJ. Also as expected, controls showed less social communication impairment than participants with ASD. However, participants with ASD did not have fewer utterances compared with control subjects. Overall, less neural synchrony in the TPJ was associated with higher social impairment and marginally fewer utterances. Our findings advance our understanding of social difficulties in ASD by linking them to decreased neural synchronization of the TPJ.

中文翻译：

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人际神经同步功能障碍是自闭症谱系障碍社交障碍的机制


自闭症谱系障碍 (ASD) 的社交缺陷与心理网络的非典型激活有关。然而，这项工作受到了限制，因为它只关注单个人在计算机化社交任务中的大脑活动，而不是探索体内交互过程中的大脑活动。目前的研究评估了对话期间的神经同步，作为自闭症谱系障碍成人 ( n = 24) 和匹配对照组 ( n = 26) 社交障碍的机制。从前额皮质 (PFC) 和颞顶交界处 (TPJ) 收集功能性近红外光谱 (fNIRS) 数据。参与者自我报告他们的社交沟通，并且对互动视频进行了言语和对话的编码。正如预期的那样，对照组在 TPJ 中表现出比患有自闭症谱系障碍 (ASD) 的参与者更多的神经同步性。同样正如预期的那样，对照组的社交沟通障碍比自闭症谱系障碍的参与者要少。然而，与对照组相比，患有自闭症谱系障碍的参与者的话语量并没有减少。总体而言，TPJ 神经同步性较低与较高的社交障碍和较少的言语相关。我们的研究结果通过将自闭症谱系障碍 (ASD) 的社交困难与 TPJ 神经同步性下降联系起来，增进了我们对自闭症谱系障碍 (ASD) 社交困难的理解。