Altered behavioral and amygdala habituation in high-functioning adults with autism spectrum disorder: an fMRI study.

Habituation to repeatedly presented stimuli is an important adaptive property of the nervous system. Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) has been associated with reduced neural habituation, for example in the amygdala, which may be related to social impairments. The main focus of this study was to investigate habituation effects on the level of behavioral responses as well as amygdala responses in adults with ASD during a working memory task flanked by task-irrelevant face stimuli.