A matter of precision? Scene imagery in individuals with high-functioning autism spectrum disorder

The ability to create mental representations of scenes is essential for remembering, predicting, and imagining. In individuals with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) this ability may be impaired. Considering that autistic characteristics such as weak central coherence or reduced communication abilities may disadvantage autistic participants in traditional imagery tasks, this study attempted to use a novel task design to measure the ability of scene imagery. Thirty high-functioning adults with ASD and 27 non-autistic matched control adults were asked to describe imagined fictitious scenes using two types of scene imagery tasks. In a free imagery task, participants were asked to imagine a scene based on a given keyword. In a guided imagery task, participants had to imagine a scene based on a detailed description of the scene. Additionally, narrative abilities were assessed using the Narrative Scoring Scheme. Statistical analyses revealed no group effects in the free and guided imagery of fictional scenes. Participants with ASD performed worse than control participants in the narrative task. Narrative abilities correlated positively with performance in both imagery tasks in the ASD group only. Hence, individuals with ASD seem to show as good imagery abilities as non-autistic individuals. The results are discussed in the light of the differences between imagery and imagination and possible gender differences. The ability to imagine is an essential basis for a wide range of cognitive functions such as thinking about the future, remembering past information, or fantasizing about (im)possible events. Previous studies suggest impairments in imagery abilities in individuals with autism spectrum disorders. However, we hypothesize that the traditional task designs used in past studies may have disadvantaged individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) given the tasks' high demands on fantasy, verbal ability, and central coherence which are often compromised in ASD. Using a novel approach-taking the characteristic neural processing style in ASD into account-, we aim to re-examine imagery in this population.