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Study finds autistics better at problem-solving
Date:6/16/2009

This release is available in French.

Montreal, June 16, 2009 Autistics are up to 40 percent faster at problem-solving than non-autistics, according to a new Universit de Montral and Harvard University study published in the journal Human Brain Mapping. As part of the investigation, participants were asked to complete patterns in the Raven's Standard Progressive Matrices (RSPM) test that measures hypothesis-testing, problem-solving and learning skills.

"While both groups performed RSPM test with equal accuracy, the autistic group responded more quickly and appeared to use perceptual regions of the brain to accelerate problem-solving," says lead author Isabelle Soulires, a post-doctoral fellow at Harvard University who completed the experiment at the Universit de Montral. "Some critics agued that autistics would be unable to complete the RSPM because of its complexity, yet our study shows autistics complete it as efficiently and have a more highly developed perception than non-autistics."

Fifteen autistics and 18 non-autistics were recruited for the study. Participants were 14 to 36 years old and matched according to their preliminary results on the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale. All subjects underwent magnetic resonance imaging to explore their neural activity during RSPM problem-solving. While autism is a common neurodevelopmental disability characterized by profound differences in information processing and analysis, this study showed that autistics have efficient reasoning abilities that build on their perceptual strengths.

"This study builds on our previous findings and should help educators capitalize on the intellectual abilities of autistics," says senior researcher Laurent Mottron, the new Marcel & Rolande Gosselin Research Chair in Autism Cognitive Neuroscience of the Universit de Montral and psychiatry profe
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Contact: Sylvain-Jacques Desjardins
sylvain-jacques.desjardins@umontreal.ca
514-343-7593
University of Montreal
Source:Eurekalert

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