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Fragmented Visuospatial Processing in Children with Pervasive Developmental Disorder

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Abstract

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.

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Acknowledgments

Wim A.J.M. Schlooz was funded by the Foundation for Child and Adolescent Psychiatry East Netherlands (SKJPON, Stichting Kinder- en Jeugdpsychiatrie Oost Nederland). The authors would like to thank Chantal Lankveld and Christine Trimbos for their assistance in testing the children. And we, of course, also thank all the children, their parents and schools for their invaluable help.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Child Psychiatry, UMCN St. Radboud ACKJON/de Lingewal, Nijmegen, The Netherlands

    Wim A. J. M. Schlooz & Pieter J. A. van den Broek

  2. Nijmegen Institute for Cognition and Information (NICI), Radboud University, Nijmegen, The Netherlands

    Wouter Hulstijn

  3. Department of Medical Psychology, UMCN St. Radboud, Nijmegen, The Netherlands

    Angela C. A. M. van der Pijll

  4. Department of Child Neurology IKNC, UMCN St. Radboud, Nijmegen, The Netherlands

    Fons Gabreëls & Jan J. Rotteveel

  5. UMCN St. Radboud ACKJON, Nijmegen, The Netherlands

    Rutger J. van der Gaag

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  1. Wim A. J. M. Schlooz
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Correspondence to Wim A. J. M. Schlooz.

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Schlooz, W.A.J.M., Hulstijn, W., van den Broek, P.J.A. et al. Fragmented Visuospatial Processing in Children with Pervasive Developmental Disorder. J Autism Dev Disord 36, 1025–1037 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-006-0140-z

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