自閉スペクトラム症のVoxel-Based Morphometry

Voxel-Based Morphometry in Autism Spectrum Disorder

自閉スペクトラム症では，社会的コミュニケーションの障害や常同的反復的行動様式などの中核症状が，精神機能の非定型発達として2〜3歳から現れる。背景には脳の非定型発達があると考えられている。先行研究は極めて多く，自閉スペクトラム症当事者と定型発達者をvoxel-based morphometryで比較した研究は，メタ解析だけで10編ほどになる。本論では先行研究における一貫性の乏しさについて考察を加えた。

Abstract

Autism spectrum disorder shows deficits in social communication and interaction including nonverbal communicative behaviors (e.g., eye contact, gestures, voice prosody, and facial expressions) and restricted and repetitive behaviors as its core symptoms. These core symptoms are emerged as an atypical behavioral development in toddlers with the disorder. Atypical neural development is considered to be a neural underpinning of such behaviorally atypical development. A number of studies using voxel-based morphometry have already been conducted to compare regional brain volumes between individuals with autism spectrum disorder and those with typical development. Furthermore, more than ten papers employing meta-analyses of the comparisons using voxel based morphometry between individuals with autism spectrum disorder and those with typical development have already been published. The current review paper adds some brief discussions about potential factors contributing to the inconsistency observed in the previous findings such as difficulty in controlling the confounding effects of different developmental phases among study participants.