Study finds weak brain connections in autistic children

Some children with autism have weak brain connections in regions that link speech with emotional rewards, possibly signalling a new pathway in treatment, researchers said on June 17. The study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences is the first to suggest that the reason why children with autism display an insensitivity to human speech may be linked to faulty circuitry in the brain's reward centers.
"Weak brain connectivity may impede children with autism from experiencing speech as pleasurable," said Vinod Menon, senior author of the study and professor of psychiatry and behavioural sciences at Stanford University. Researchers took magnetic resonance imaging brain scans of 20 children with a high-functioning type of autism; they had normal range IQs and could speak and read, but had a hard time in conversation or understanding emotional cues. By comparing the scans to those of 19 children without autism, they found that the brains of youngsters with autism showed poor connections to brain regions that release dopamine in response to rewards.