Asperger's Syndrome Research Today is a free monthly online journal that collates and summarizes the latest research about Asperger's Syndrome, including details on symptoms, diagnosis, treatment, medication.

Fragmented Visuospatial Processing in Children with Pervasive Developmental Disorder.

Schlooz WA, Hulstijn W, van den Broek PJ, van der Pijll AC, Gabreëls F, van der Gaag RJ, Rotteveel JJ

Department of Child Psychiatry, UMCN St. Radboud ACKJON/de Lingewal, Nijmegen, The Netherlands, w.schlooz@RvAgroep.nl.

Children diagnosed with Pervasive Developmental Disorder Not Otherwise Specified (PDD-NOS) and Asperger Syndrome (AS) may be characterised by a similar perceptual focus on details as children with autistic disorder (AD). This was tested by analysing their performance in a visuoperceptual task [the Children's Embedded Figure Test (CEFT)] and a graphic reproduction task [the Rey Complex Figure Task (Rey CFT)]. Control groups were children with Tourette Syndrome (TS) and typically developing children. The TS sample performed similarly to the normal control group in both tasks. The CEFT results did not show the expected preference for local processing in children with PDD-NOS. However, the Rey CFT data revealed that the children with this lesser variant of PDD processed visuospatial information in a fragmented way and were deficient in global processing.

Published 9 August 2006 in J Autism Dev Disord.
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