Satu Saalasti | Aalto University, School of Science (original) (raw)
Papers by Satu Saalasti
Frontiers in Cellular Neuroscience
Clinical neurophysiology: official journal of the International Federation of Clinical Neurophysiology
Asperger syndrome, belonging to the autistic spectrum of disorders, involves deficits in social i... more Asperger syndrome, belonging to the autistic spectrum of disorders, involves deficits in social interaction and prosodic use of language but normal development of formal language abilities. Auditory processing involves both hyper- and hypoactive reactivity to acoustic changes.
![Research paper thumbnail of Corrigendum to “Auditory stream segregation in children with Asperger syndrome” [Biol. Psychol. 82 (2009) 301–307]](https://attachments.academia-assets.com/46811221/thumbnails/1.jpg)
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Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders
Current diagnostic taxonomies (ICD-10, DSM-IV) emphasize normal acquisition of language in Asperg... more Current diagnostic taxonomies (ICD-10, DSM-IV) emphasize normal acquisition of language in Asperger syndrome (AS). Although many linguistic sub-skills may be fairly normal in AS there are also contradictory findings.
Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 2012
Audiovisual speech perception was studied in adults with Asperger syndrome (AS), by utilizing the... more Audiovisual speech perception was studied in adults with Asperger syndrome (AS), by utilizing the McGurk effect, in which conflicting visual articulation alters the perception of heard speech. The AS group perceived the audiovisual stimuli differently from age, sex and IQ matched controls. When a voice saying /p/ was presented with a face articulating /k/, the controls predominantly heard /k/. Instead, the AS group heard /k/ and /t/ with almost equal frequency, but with large differences between individuals. There were no differences in gaze direction or unisensory perception between the AS and control participants that could have contributed to the audiovisual differences. We suggest an explanation in terms of weak support from the motor system for audiovisual speech perception in AS.
Neuropsychologia, 2008
The theory of ‘weak central coherence’ [Happe, F., & Frith, U. (2006). The weak coherence account... more The theory of ‘weak central coherence’ [Happe, F., & Frith, U. (2006). The weak coherence account: Detail-focused cognitive style in autism spectrum disorders. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 36(1), 5–25] implies that persons with autism spectrum disorders (ASDs) have a perceptual bias for local but not for global stimulus features. The recognition of emotional facial expressions representing various different levels of detail has not been studied previously in ASDs. We analyzed the recognition of four basic emotional facial expressions (anger, disgust, fear and happiness) from low-spatial frequencies (overall global shapes without local features) in adults with an ASD. A group of 20 participants with Asperger syndrome (AS) was compared to a group of non-autistic age- and sex-matched controls. Emotion recognition was tested from static and dynamic facial expressions whose spatial frequency contents had been manipulated by low-pass filtering at two levels. The two groups recognized emotions similarly from non-filtered faces and from dynamic vs. static facial expressions. In contrast, the participants with AS were less accurate than controls in recognizing facial emotions from very low-spatial frequencies. The results suggest intact recognition of basic facial emotions and dynamic facial information, but impaired visual processing of global features in ASDs.
Experimental Brain Research, 2011
Individuals with Asperger syndrome (AS) have problems in following conversation, especially in th... more Individuals with Asperger syndrome (AS) have problems in following conversation, especially in the situations where several people are talking. This might result from impairments in audiovisual speech perception, especially from difficulties in focusing attention to speechrelevant visual information and ignoring distracting information. We studied the effect of visual spatial attention on the audiovisual speech perception of adult individuals with AS and matched control participants. Two faces were presented side by side, one uttering /aka/ and the other /ata/, while an auditory stimulus of /apa/ was played. The participants fixated on a central cross and directed their attention to the face that an arrow pointed to, reporting which consonant they heard. We hypothesized that the adults with AS would be more distracted by a competing talking face than the controls. Instead, they were able to covertly attend to the talking face, and they were as distracted by a competing face as the controls. Independently of the attentional effect, there was a qualitative difference in audiovisual speech perception: when the visual articulation was /aka/, the control participants heard /aka/ almost exclusively, while the participants with AS heard frequently /ata/. This finding may relate to difficulties in face-to-face communication in AS.
Experimental Brain Research, 2012
Biological Psychology, 2009
Frontiers in Cellular Neuroscience
Clinical neurophysiology: official journal of the International Federation of Clinical Neurophysiology
Asperger syndrome, belonging to the autistic spectrum of disorders, involves deficits in social i... more Asperger syndrome, belonging to the autistic spectrum of disorders, involves deficits in social interaction and prosodic use of language but normal development of formal language abilities. Auditory processing involves both hyper- and hypoactive reactivity to acoustic changes.
Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders
Current diagnostic taxonomies (ICD-10, DSM-IV) emphasize normal acquisition of language in Asperg... more Current diagnostic taxonomies (ICD-10, DSM-IV) emphasize normal acquisition of language in Asperger syndrome (AS). Although many linguistic sub-skills may be fairly normal in AS there are also contradictory findings.
Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 2012
Audiovisual speech perception was studied in adults with Asperger syndrome (AS), by utilizing the... more Audiovisual speech perception was studied in adults with Asperger syndrome (AS), by utilizing the McGurk effect, in which conflicting visual articulation alters the perception of heard speech. The AS group perceived the audiovisual stimuli differently from age, sex and IQ matched controls. When a voice saying /p/ was presented with a face articulating /k/, the controls predominantly heard /k/. Instead, the AS group heard /k/ and /t/ with almost equal frequency, but with large differences between individuals. There were no differences in gaze direction or unisensory perception between the AS and control participants that could have contributed to the audiovisual differences. We suggest an explanation in terms of weak support from the motor system for audiovisual speech perception in AS.
Neuropsychologia, 2008
The theory of ‘weak central coherence’ [Happe, F., & Frith, U. (2006). The weak coherence account... more The theory of ‘weak central coherence’ [Happe, F., & Frith, U. (2006). The weak coherence account: Detail-focused cognitive style in autism spectrum disorders. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 36(1), 5–25] implies that persons with autism spectrum disorders (ASDs) have a perceptual bias for local but not for global stimulus features. The recognition of emotional facial expressions representing various different levels of detail has not been studied previously in ASDs. We analyzed the recognition of four basic emotional facial expressions (anger, disgust, fear and happiness) from low-spatial frequencies (overall global shapes without local features) in adults with an ASD. A group of 20 participants with Asperger syndrome (AS) was compared to a group of non-autistic age- and sex-matched controls. Emotion recognition was tested from static and dynamic facial expressions whose spatial frequency contents had been manipulated by low-pass filtering at two levels. The two groups recognized emotions similarly from non-filtered faces and from dynamic vs. static facial expressions. In contrast, the participants with AS were less accurate than controls in recognizing facial emotions from very low-spatial frequencies. The results suggest intact recognition of basic facial emotions and dynamic facial information, but impaired visual processing of global features in ASDs.
Experimental Brain Research, 2011
Individuals with Asperger syndrome (AS) have problems in following conversation, especially in th... more Individuals with Asperger syndrome (AS) have problems in following conversation, especially in the situations where several people are talking. This might result from impairments in audiovisual speech perception, especially from difficulties in focusing attention to speechrelevant visual information and ignoring distracting information. We studied the effect of visual spatial attention on the audiovisual speech perception of adult individuals with AS and matched control participants. Two faces were presented side by side, one uttering /aka/ and the other /ata/, while an auditory stimulus of /apa/ was played. The participants fixated on a central cross and directed their attention to the face that an arrow pointed to, reporting which consonant they heard. We hypothesized that the adults with AS would be more distracted by a competing talking face than the controls. Instead, they were able to covertly attend to the talking face, and they were as distracted by a competing face as the controls. Independently of the attentional effect, there was a qualitative difference in audiovisual speech perception: when the visual articulation was /aka/, the control participants heard /aka/ almost exclusively, while the participants with AS heard frequently /ata/. This finding may relate to difficulties in face-to-face communication in AS.
Experimental Brain Research, 2012
Biological Psychology, 2009