Brain scans of 80 boys suggest that how well attention networks hold together shapes communication in autism, and that verbal and nonverbal difficulties draw on somewhat different attention mechanisms.

Difficulty with communication is one of the defining features of autism spectrum disorder. Some autistic children are slow to begin speaking or struggle to hold a conversation. Others find it hard to use and read gestures, facial expressions and eye contact. Research has long focused on the brain’s language system to explain these challenges. A new study from HSE University in Moscow suggests the brain’s attention systems deserve as much scrutiny.

Writing in European Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, researchers at the HSE Centre for Language and Brain report that the strength of communication within and between attention networks in the brain was linked to the severity of communication difficulties in boys with autism. They also found that verbal and nonverbal difficulties were tied to somewhat different patterns.

“The study shows that communication difficulties are related not only to characteristics of the language system but also to the mechanisms of attention,” said Alina Minnigulova, a research fellow at the centre. “At the same time, verbal and non-verbal communication difficulties appear to involve somewhat different mechanisms: in one case, maintaining attention is key, while in the other, both maintaining and switching attention are involved.”

Listening to the resting brain

The team drew on ABIDE II, a large, publicly shared collection of brain imaging data from autistic and non-autistic people gathered at sites around the world. From it they selected 80 boys aged 5 to 12, of whom 53 had a diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder and 27 were typically developing.

All of the children had undergone resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging, in which a scanner records brain activity while a person lies still without performing a particular task. Even at rest, brain regions that work together tend to show synchronized fluctuations in activity. Measuring how closely regions rise and fall in step, known as functional connectivity, gives researchers a map of the brain’s large-scale networks and how strongly they are coupled.

The researchers focused on four networks. The language network supports understanding and producing speech. The dorsal attention network helps direct and sustain attention toward relevant things in the environment. The salience network detects important events and helps the brain switch between different modes of processing. The default mode network is most active when attention turns inward, such as during daydreaming or thinking about oneself and others.

To measure communication, the team used scores from the Autism Diagnostic Interview-Revised, a detailed structured interview with parents or caregivers that is widely used in autism diagnosis and research. It includes separate measures of verbal and nonverbal communication. The researchers used principal component analysis, a statistical technique for condensing many related measurements into a smaller number of underlying patterns, to identify the key features of network connectivity.

A language network wired differently

Compared with typically developing boys, the boys with autism showed a distinctive pattern of connections involving the language network. Its connectivity with the salience network was lower, while its connectivity with the default mode network was higher.

That combination is suggestive. The salience network helps flag what matters in the moment, such as a voice directed at a child, and helps shift the brain into a mode suited to responding. Weaker links between it and the language system could make it harder to bring language processing to bear on the right signals at the right time. Stronger links with the inward-facing default mode network might, in turn, reflect a language system that is less tuned toward the outside world, although the study does not test those interpretations directly.

Sustaining versus switching

The most striking results came when the researchers looked at how network connectivity tracked the severity of communication difficulties within the autism group.

For nonverbal communication, which includes gestures, facial expressions and the use of eye gaze, the key factor was connectivity within the dorsal attention network. Boys whose dorsal attention network was less tightly connected internally tended to have greater nonverbal difficulties. The researchers interpret this as pointing to the importance of sustaining attention.

For verbal communication, the picture was more complex. Weaker connectivity within the dorsal attention network mattered here too, but so did weaker connectivity between the dorsal attention network and the salience network. Because the salience network plays a central role in shifting attention, the authors link verbal difficulties to both maintaining attention and switching it.

That distinction makes intuitive sense. Following and taking part in a conversation requires a child not only to stay focused on a speaker but to move attention flexibly, from one speaker to another, from the words to their meaning, and from listening to responding.

What the findings could mean

Attention differences are already well documented in autism, and many autistic children also meet criteria for attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder. But the role of attention in communication has received less focus than the language system itself. The new findings suggest the two are closely intertwined.

The work could eventually inform how communication support is designed. If attention mechanisms contribute to communication difficulties, then approaches that help children sustain or shift attention might complement language-focused therapies. The distinction between verbal and nonverbal difficulties also hints that different children could benefit from different emphases, depending on which kind of communication is most challenging for them.

Limits of the study

The study has important limitations. It included only boys, so it is not clear whether the same patterns hold in autistic girls, who are diagnosed less often and may show different profiles. The sample, while drawn from a large database, was modest in size, and the age range covered only middle childhood.

The findings are also correlational. They show that certain patterns of brain connectivity go along with more severe communication difficulties, not that one causes the other. Resting-state imaging captures the brain at rest rather than during conversation, and communication was measured through caregiver interviews rather than direct observation. Studies that track children over time, include girls and measure brain activity during communication tasks would help test whether the attention mechanisms identified here play the role the researchers propose.

Even so, the study adds to a growing view of autism as involving differences in how large-scale brain networks coordinate with one another, rather than in a single isolated system. For communication, the results suggest, what matters is not just the language machinery but how well the brain can hold and shift its focus.

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Notes

1. “Contribution of attentional mechanisms to verbal and nonverbal communication in boys with ASD.” European Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 16 June 2026. DOI: 10.1007/s00787-026-03089-1.
2. HSE University. “Researchers reveal link between attention and communication difficulties in autism.” EurekAlert!, 29 July 2026. https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/1138740.