Sensory sensitivity in autism mostly depends on contextual predictions

ABSTRACT

A signal detection theory was elaborated in order to account for three types of sensory sensitivity (subjective, behavioral and neural) in neurotypical individuals and in autism. Here, we argue that the predictive coding framework could better account for the atypical pattern of sensory sensitivity in autism. We review the idea that sensory sensitivity should be considered as mostly depending on contextual predictions and that these account for the heterogeneous pattern of neural responses.

KEYWORDS:

• Autism spectrum disorder
• predictive coding
• sensory sensitivity
• hypersensitivity
• predictions
• inflexibility

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.