In Episode 43 we are joined by Todd Kamensek from the Neuroscience of Vision and Action Laboratory at the University of British Columbia to chat about how social motivation influences facial perception abilities in adults with autism. Todd shares with us how repeated exposure to social stimuli increases our expertise at being able to identify social cues, and how differences in social motivation for individuals with autism might be diminishing the amount of experience they are getting and therefore the expertise gained. We learn how, for neurotypical adults, there is no relationship between an individual’s ability to identify faces or facial expressions but, in those with autism, these processes are related. How does experience alter perception? What is prosopagnosia and what does it tell us about how the brain processes faces? What is a face diet? All this and much more in Facial Perception in Adults with Autism with Todd Kamensek!
References
Kamensek, T., Shafai, F., Iarocci, G., & Oruc, I. (2018). An eye for detail: Is spatial frequency processing a source for enhanced cortical functioning in people with autism spectrum disorder? Journal of Vision, 18(10), 36. doi:10.1167/18.10.36