Difficulties in perceptual-motor coordination of reaching behavior in children with autism spectrum disorder

Increased risk of injury from collisions with objects is an important issue in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). The purpose of the present study was to examine whether impaired perceptual-motor coordination may underlie the high frequency of collisions. Specifically, we hypothesized that collisions are likely to occur frequently in children with ASD due to their difficulty with body-related spatial perception and their inadequate motor planning, due to their detail-focused processing style, i.e., a tendency to focus attention on specific details rather than on the overall context. To evaluate impairment of perceptual-motor coordination in children with ASD, an original action selection task was developed to assess (a) body-related spatial perception and (b) predictive attentional properties for planning the subsequent movements based on the measures of hand movement and gaze behavior. Twenty-six children (13 diagnosed as ASD and 13 with typical development [TD]) completed the task, and their parents completed a questionnaire regarding their child's susceptibility to injury. Results showed that children with ASD displayed inaccurate body-related spatial perception and inadequate motor planning under conditions that induced their detail-focused processing style. In addition, analyses of gaze behavior reflected the characteristics of a detail-focused processing in children with ASD. This was correlated with the severity of ASD and the measure of motor planning. The present findings suggest that difficulty with perceptual-motor coordination, resulting in part from the detail-focused processing style, might contribute to susceptibility to injury in children with ASD. We consider that our evaluation of the difficulty with perceptual-motor of individuals with ASD provides a framework for understanding their high rate of collision-related injuries and could inform strategies for preventing these injuries.