A cognitive architecture account of the visual local advantage phenomenon in autism spectrum disorders

•A model of typical vision is applied to explain the visual local advantage in autism.•In this model, neuronal synchronization subserves perceptual integration.•This integration yields global structures that mask incompatible local features.•Impairments in synchronization, as found in autism, reduce this masking effect.•In autism, this accounts for the superior detection of incompatible local features.

Ideally, a cognitive architecture is a neurally plausible model that unifies mental representations and cognitive processes. Here, I apply such a model to re-evaluate the local advantage phenomenon in autism spectrum disorders (ASD), that is, the better than typical performance on visual tasks in which local stimulus features are to be discerned. The model takes (a) perceptual organization as a predominantly stimulus-driven process yielding hierarchical stimulus organizations, and (b) attention as predominantly scrutinizing the hierarchical structure of established percepts in a task-driven top-down fashion. This accounts for a dominance of wholes over parts and implies that perceived global structures mask incompatible local features. The model also substantiates that impairments in neuronal synchronization - as found in ASD - reduce the emergence of global structures and, thereby, their masking effect on incompatible features. I argue that this explains the local advantage phenomenon and I discuss implications and suggestions for future research.