Cerebral asymmetry and the development of early infantile autism

Abstract

Two experiments involving listening preferences of autistic and normal subjects were conducted to test the hypothesis that the right cerebral hemisphere is more active than the left hemisphere in autistic children. Results showed that when given a choice between verbal and musical material, the autistic children preferred music, while normal children showed no preference. Secondly, autistic children listened to both types of material predominantly with the left ear. Although normal subjects showed greater variation among themselves, they tended to listen to music more often with the left ear and to listen to verbal material more often with the right. These results support the notion that some autistic children are predominantly right-hemisphere processors.