Ocular Fixation Abnormality in Patients with Autism Spectrum Disorder.

The team asked the adults with autism and 24 typical adults to look at a screen.

A dot appeared in the center, then vanished. Cameras tracked eye drift for 3-5 seconds.

The test ran twice: once with no visible cue, once with a faint square at the edge.

Without a cue, the autism group’s eyes wandered twice as far.

The gap shrank when the faint square was present.

Surprise: poor fixation did not link to poor antisaccade scores, so the trouble is not general motor control.

Spanoudis et al. (2011) saw the same adults look less at eyes during social clips. Aya et al. now show the drift also hits non-social scenes.

Wan et al. (2019) turned the idea into a 10-second toddler screen that flags ASD with 85 % accuracy. The 2016 data say the signal starts early and lasts.

Fitzgerald et al. (2015) found teens with autism use different brain wires for attention even when scores look normal. The unstable eye fits that wiring gap.

If a client’s eyes roam, it may not be lack of interest—it could be weak peripheral anchoring.

Add a clear border, sticky note, or colored edge near your materials. One simple cue cut drift in half in the lab. Try it during table work or tablet tasks next session.