Children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) have difficulty in controlling visual perception. During assessments that use standard procedures, the visual perception of children with ASD may not be evaluated appropriately because they do not include motivating operations and they present few variations in the position of stimuli. This study evaluated four perceptual functions ecologically (visual fixation, visual pursuit, joint attention, sound localization) in a 5-year-old boy with severe ASD. To do so, we devised "ecological assessments," where the experimenter used objects the participant liked and presented the stimuli at various positions in a large room. All experiments were conducted while the participant was playing his favorite puzzle. (1) During the visual fixation experiment, we examined whether the participant looked at a puzzle piece when it was presented at various positions over the desk. (2) During the visual pursuit experiment, we examined whether the participant continued to look at a puzzle piece when it was moved to various positions over the desk. (3) During the joint attention experiment, we examined whether the participant looked at a puzzle piece that the experimenter pointed to in a large room. (4) During the sound localization experiment, we examined whether the participant looked at a puzzle piece when a sound came from the direction of the piece. As a result, the participant responded correctly to 100% of the visual fixation trials, 30% of the visual pursuit trials, 97% of the joint attention trials and 88% of the sound localization trials. Therefore, during an ecological assessment, the child with severe ASD was able to control their visual perception of stimuli in various positions. On the other hand, the child had difficulty with visual pursuit; therefore, practice in sustaining visual attention would be necessary.
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