SynthesisJournal of autism and developmental disorders2023
Slower Processing Speed in Autism Spectrum Disorder: A Meta-analytic Investigation of Time-Based Tasks.
Synthesis in Journal of autism and developmental disorders, 2023. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 23 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
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.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
23 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 36 citations in OpenAlex.
- Cognitive and Cerebral Aging Research in Autism: A Systematic Review on an Emerging Topic.Autism research : official journal of the International Society for Autism Research · 2025Pooled it
- Cognitive Profile in Autism and ADHD: A Meta-Analysis of Performance on the WAIS-IV and WISC-V.Archives of clinical neuropsychology : the official journal of the National Academy of Neuropsychologists · 2024Pooled it
- Reasonable to Whom? Rethinking Informed Consent Disclosures in Light of the Research Related Concerns of the Autistic Community.The American journal of bioethics : AJOB · 2026Article
- Cognitive Aging Patterns in Autism: Parallel, Accelerated, or Safeguarded?Journal of autism and developmental disorders · 2026Article
- In Search of Subtypes of Children With Developmental Disabilities Using the WISC-V: A Latent Profile Analysis.Journal of autism and developmental disorders · 2026Article
- Preservation of Higher-Order Cognition in Autistic Females: Evidence from Two Deeply-Phenotyped Cohorts in Hong Kong and the United States.Research square · 2026Article
- Visual Search Performance in Children With ASD: A Combined Case-Control and Longitudinal Study.Autism research : official journal of the International Society for Autism Research · 2026Article
- Comparison of the K-WPPSI-IV Profiles Between Children With Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder and Children With Autism Spectrum Disorder: A Retrospective Study.Psychiatry investigation · 2026Article
- Finding the forest in the trees: Using machine learning and online cognitive and perceptual measures to predict adult autism diagnosis.Translational psychiatry · 2026Article
- 'Bridging the gap': exploring shared decision-making with autistic young people within an NHS Learning Disability and Autism Keyworker Programme in England.BMC health services research · 2026Article
- Cognitive Profile of Autism and Intellectual Disorder in Wechsler's Scales: Meta-Analysis.European journal of investigation in health, psychology and education · 2026Review
- Sensory Processing of Time and Space in Autistic Children.Children (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Article
- Multisensory Integration of Naturalistic Speech and Gestures in Autistic Adults.Autism research : official journal of the International Society for Autism Research · 2025Article
- Trait and state mathematics anxiety in autistic and non-autistic school-aged boys.Autism : the international journal of research and practice · 2025Article
- Slow but Steady: Similarities and Differences in Executive Functioning Between Autistic and Non-Autistic Adults.Autism research : official journal of the International Society for Autism Research · 2025Article
- "A System That Wasn't Really Optimized for Me": Factors Influencing Autistic University Students' Access to Information.Autism in adulthood · 2025Article
- The "Tetris effect": autistic and non-autistic people share an implicit drive for perceptual cohesion.Molecular autism · 2025Article
- Cognitive flexibility in autism: How task predictability and sex influence performances.Autism research : official journal of the International Society for Autism Research · 2025Article
- Use of a predictor cue during a speech sound discrimination task in a Cntnap2 knockout rat model of autism.PloS one · 2025Article
- "There is just too much going on there": Nonverbal communication experiences of autistic adults.PloS one · 2025Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a complex neurodevelopmental condition affecting information processing across domains. The current meta-analysis investigated whether slower processing speed is associated with the ASD neurocognitive profile and whether findings hold across different time-based tasks and stimuli (social vs. nonsocial; linguistic vs. nonlinguistic). Mean RTs of ASD and age-matched neurotypical comparison groups (N = 893 ASD, 1063 neurotypical; mean age ASD group = 17 years) were compared across simple RT, choice RT, and interference control tasks (44 studies, 106 effects) using robust variance estimation meta-analysis. Simple RT tasks required participants to respond to individual stimuli, whereas choice RT tasks required forced-choice responses to two or more stimuli. Interference control tasks required a decision in the context of a distractor or priming stimulus; in an effort to minimize inhibitory demands, we extracted RTs only from baseline and congruent conditions of such tasks. All tasks required nonverbal (motor) responses. The overall effect-size estimate indicated significantly longer mean RTs in ASD groups (g = .35, 95% CI = .16; .54) than comparison groups. Task type moderated effects, with larger estimates drawn from simple RT tasks than interference control tasks. However, across all three task types, ASD groups exhibited significantly longer mean RTs than comparison groups. Stimulus type and age did not moderate effects. Generalized slowing may be a domain-general characteristic of ASD with potential consequences for social, language, and motor development. Assessing processing speed may inform development of interventions to support autistic individuals and their diverse cognitive profiles.
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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.