The Neural Oscillatory Basis of Perspective‐Taking in Autistic and Non‐Autistic Adolescents Using Magnetoencephalography

Abstract

Taking another's perspective is a high‐level mental skill underlying many aspects of social cognition. Perspective‐taking is usually an embodied egocentric process whereby people mentally rotate themselves away from their physical location into the other's orientation. This is accompanied by increased theta‐band (3–7 Hz) brain oscillations within a widespread fronto‐parietal cortical network including the temporoparietal junction. Individuals with autism spectrum conditions (ASC) have been reported to experience challenges with high‐level perspective‐taking, particularly when adopting embodied strategies. To investigate the potential neurophysiological basis of these autism‐related individual differences, we used magnetoencephalography in combination with a well‐replicated perspective‐taking paradigm in a group of 18 autistic and 17 age‐matched non‐autistic adolescents. Findings revealed that increasing the angle between self and other perspective resulted in prolonged reaction times for the autistic group during perspective‐taking. This was accompanied by reduced theta power across a wide network of regions typically active during social cognitive tasks. On the other hand, the autistic group showed greater alpha power decreases in visual cortex compared with the non‐autistic group across all perspective‐taking conditions. These divergent theta and alpha power effects, coupled with steeper response time slopes, suggest that autistic individuals may rely more on alternative cognitive strategies, such as mental object rotation, rather than an egocentric embodied approach. Finally, no group differences were found when participants were asked to track, rather than take, another's viewpoint, suggesting that autism‐related individual differences are specific to high‐level perspective‐taking.

Publication DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ejn.70109
Divisions: College of Health & Life Sciences > School of Psychology
Funding Information: We thank the Wellcome Trust (088314/Z/09/Z), Dr Hadwen Trust and Tommy's Fund for supporting research costs. Robert Seymour was supported by a cotutelle PhD studentship from Aston University and Macquarie University.
Additional Information: Copyright © 2025 The Author(s). European Journal of Neuroscience published by Federation of European Neuroscience Societies and John Wiley & Sons Ltd. This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Uncontrolled Keywords: MEG,autism,brain oscillations,perspective-taking,social cognition,General Neuroscience
Publication ISSN: 1460-9568
Last Modified: 02 May 2025 16:41
Date Deposited: 25 Apr 2025 11:22
Full Text Link:
Related URLs: https://onlinel ... .1111/ejn.70109 (Publisher URL)
http://www.scop ... tnerID=8YFLogxK (Scopus URL)
PURE Output Type: Article
Published Date: 2025-04-16
Published Online Date: 2025-04-16
Accepted Date: 2025-03-27
Authors: Seymour, Robert A. (ORCID Profile 0000-0001-8600-8123)
Rippon, Gina (ORCID Profile 0000-0001-9807-4945)
Gooding‐Williams, Gerard
Wang, Hongfang
Kessler, Klaus

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License: Creative Commons Attribution


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