ArticleHuman brain mapping2017
Hypersensitivity to low intensity fearful faces in autism when fixation is constrained to the eyes.
Article in Human brain mapping, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 21 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
21 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 47 citations in OpenAlex.
- The functional neural architecture of dysfunctional reward processing in autism.NeuroImage. Clinical · 2021Pooled it
- Should perception of emotions be classified according to threat detection rather than emotional valence? An updated meta-analysis for a whole-brain atlas of emotional faces processing.Journal of psychiatry & neuroscience : JPNPooled it
- Bumetanide for autism: more eye contact, less amygdala activation.Scientific reports · 2018Trial
- Neuroimaging Evidence of Facial Emotion Processing in Autism Spectrum Disorder: A Meta-Analysis of Functional Neuroimaging Studies.Journal of autism and developmental disorders · 2025Article
- Empathy as risk and protective factor in the development of adolescent aggression; the role of autism unraveled.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Autistic eye contact? A hermeneutic phenomenological multicenter study of the similarities and differences in eye-contact experiences between adults with and without autism.Journal of neurodevelopmental disorders · 2025Article
- Dialectical Behavior Therapy in Autism.Current psychiatry reports · 2025Review
- Pupil contagion variation with gaze, arousal, and autistic traits.Scientific reports · 2024Article
- Review
- Autistic and non-autistic individuals show the same amygdala activity during emotional face processing.Molecular autism · 2024Article
- Temporal characteristics of facial ensemble in individuals with autism spectrum disorder: examination from arousal and attentional allocation.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2024Article
- Neural correlates of facial recognition deficits in autism spectrum disorder: a comprehensive review.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2024Review
- Eye Gaze in Autism Spectrum Disorder: A Review of Neural Evidence for the Eye Avoidance Hypothesis.Journal of autism and developmental disorders · 2023Review
- A Scoping Review of Behavioral Interventions for Promoting Social Gaze in Individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder and Other Developmental Disabilities.Research in autism spectrum disorders · 2023Article
- Linehan's biosocial model applied to emotion dysregulation in autism: a narrative review of the literature and an illustrative case conceptualization.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2023Review
- Altered intrinsic brain activity and connectivity in unaffected parents of individuals with autism spectrum disorder: a resting-state fMRI study.Frontiers in human neuroscience · 2022Article
- Case of Asperger's Syndrome and Lesion of the Right Amygdala: Deficits in Implicit and Explicit Fearful Face Recognition.Frontiers in psychology · 2021Article
- Sensory Processing Patterns and Fusiform Activity During Face Processing in Autism Spectrum Disorder.Autism research : official journal of the International Society for Autism Research · 2020Article
- Facial Expression Processing Across the Autism-Psychosis Spectra: A Review of Neural Findings and Associations With Adverse Childhood Events.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2020Review
- Impairments in cognitive empathy and alexithymia occur independently of executive functioning in college students with autism.Autism : the international journal of research and practice · 2019Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
9 authors at 3 institutions in 4 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Previous studies that showed decreased brain activation in people with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) viewing expressive faces did not control that participants looked in the eyes. This is problematic because ASD is characterized by abnormal attention to the eyes. Here, we collected fMRI data from 48 participants (27 ASD) viewing pictures of neutral faces and faces expressing anger, happiness, and fear at low and high intensity, with a fixation cross between the eyes. Group differences in whole brain activity were examined for expressive faces at high and low intensity versus neutral faces. Group differences in neural activity were also investigated in regions of interest within the social brain, including the amygdala and the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC). In response to low intensity fearful faces, ASD participants showed increased activation in the social brain regions, and decreased functional coupling between the amygdala and the vmPFC. This oversensitivity to low intensity fear coupled with a lack of emotional regulation capacity could indicate an excitatory/inhibitory imbalance in their socio-affective processing system. This may result in social disengagement and avoidance of eye-contact to handle feelings of strong emotional reaction. Our results also demonstrate the importance of careful control of gaze when investigating emotional processing in ASD. Hum Brain Mapp 38:5943-5957, 2017. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.