Enhanced use of gaze cue in a face-following task after brief trial experience in individuals with autism spectrum disorder

Eye movements toward sequentially presented face images with or without gaze cues were recorded to investigate whether those with ASD, in comparison to their typically developing (TD) peers, could prospectively perform the task according to gaze cues. Line-drawn face images were sequentially presented for one second each on a laptop PC display, and the face images shifted from side-to-side and up-and-down. In the gaze cue condition, the gaze of the face image was directed to the position where the next face would be presented. Although the participants with ASD looked less at the eye area of the face image than their TD peers, they could perform comparable smooth gaze shift to the gaze cue of the face image in the gaze cue condition. This appropriate gaze shift in the ASD group was more evident in the second half of trials in than in the first half, as revealed by the mean proportion of fixation time in the eye area to valid gaze data in the early phase (during face image presentation) and the time to first fixation on the eye area. These results suggest that individuals with ASD may benefit from the short-period trial experiment by enhancing the usage of gaze cue.