Affective Prosody Recognition and Auditory Intervention for Children With Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD)

Summary

The proposed study aims to examine the abilities of children with ASD to recognize emotional tones of voice - also known as affective prosody - as compared to typically developing (TD) children. Past findings are mixed, and although some studies have found intact performance among individuals with ASD, it is possible that they rely on different underlying mechanisms in processing affective prosody compared to TD children. Our second objective is therefore to examine whether children with ASD have a stronger reliance on psychoacoustic abilities - including rapid auditory processing and pitch direction recognition - to identify emotional stimuli, as compared to TD children. Lastly, the investigators will study whether auditory training targeting psychoacoustic abilities would improve affective prosody recognition among children with ASD. Sixty children with ASD and 60 TD children between 10 to 12 years old will be recruited. Participants' psychoacoustic abilities and affective prosody recognition will be assessed in the pretest. The investigators hypothesize that psychoacoustic abilities are stronger predictors of affective prosody recognition among children with ASD than among TD children. The ASD children will then be randomly assigned to two groups: one group will receive auditory training; the other will be an active control group that receives non-auditory training. Both groups will receive 12 hours of training via a mobile app. The children will be assessed again in the posttest.

Conditions

• Autism Spectrum Disorder

Interventions

BEHAVIORAL

Auditory Training

A series of psychoacoustic training exercises through Posit Science - BrainHQ (mobile app or web-browser version). Each training is approximately 2 minutes

BEHAVIORAL

Non-auditory training

A series of non-psychoacoustic training exercises through Posit Science - BrainHQ (mobile app or web-browser version). Each training is approximately 2 minutes

Sponsors & Collaborators

• The Hong Kong Polytechnic University

  collaborator OTHER

• Education University of Hong Kong

  collaborator OTHER

• Hong Kong Baptist University

  lead OTHER

Principal Investigators

• Ann M Lui, PhD · Hong Kong Baptist University

Study Design

Allocation

NON_RANDOMIZED

Purpose

TREATMENT

Masking

NONE

Model

PARALLEL

Eligibility

Min Age

8 Years

Max Age

14 Years

Sex

ALL

Healthy Volunteers

Yes

Timeline & Regulatory

Start

2020-09-25

Primary Completion

2021-12-31

Completion

2021-12-31

Countries

• Hong Kong

Study Locations