Poster Presentation

Poster E in Poster Session E: Thursday, August 6, 10:30 am – 12:15 pm, Kimmel Center, Shorin & Rosenthal Rooms

Feedback Salience Differentially Affects Decision Strategies but Homogenizes Neuronal Responses in Autism and Neurotypical Individuals

Jaroslav Slobodskoy-Plusnin¹, Nathaniel Zuk², Aviel Sulem¹, Vishnu Sampath¹, Merav Ahissar¹; ¹Hebrew University of Jerusalem, ²Hebrew University, Nottingham Trent University

Presenter: Jaroslav Slobodskoy-Plusnin

Whether feedback properties independent of task information – such as feedback salience and value – modulate decision-making processes and their neural correlates in autism spectrum disorder (ASD) remains unclear. We examined behavioral strategies and EEG responses in autistic and neurotypical (NT) participants across three studies of an auditory frequency discrimination task, differing only in feedback properties: standard, visually salient and monetary. Perceptual recency bias was quantified as the accuracy difference between trials consistent versus inconsistent with recent stimulus history. In the standard protocol, NT participants exhibited online updating of recency bias, with stronger bias following correct easy compared to correct hard trials, whereas ASD participants demonstrated a feedback-driven (lose-switch) strategy following incorrect trials, despite no group differences in overall accuracy. This dissociation was paralleled by reduced feedback-related negativity (FRN) in ASD and successful group classification using multivariate pattern analysis (BACC=0.73, p<0.001). Increasing feedback salience – both visually and via monetary reward – altered these patterns: NT lost online updating, ASD showed strengthened feedback-driven behavior, while both univariate FRN and MVPA failed to separate the groups. These findings demonstrate distinct decision-making strategies in NT and ASD, even when increased feedback salience eliminates neuronal group differences. This suggests that meta-level parameters of decision-making differ between groups but could be similarly modulated by salience and reward.

Topic Area: Development, Individual Differences & Clinical Populations