Increased neural noise is less likely to have an advantageous effect on cognitive task performance however, as it may lead to a number of sub-optimal outcomes including a general decrease in response times and greater response time variability, more errors in tasks with more than one possible response, and the need for increased repetitions of a task to achieve the same outcome as those with lower levels of noise. Furthermore, noise-related reduction in task performance would be evidenced by impairments across many domains and tasks, rather than in isolated tasks, and it would also lead to increased inter-participant variability. This description of data is very similar to that represented by the literature on cognitive function in ASD. Increased neural noise is therefore a plausible, and parsimonious, explanation both for the array of cognitive tasks in which participants with ASD have been shown to perform more poorly than those without ASD, and for the significant inter-individual variability present in those with ASD. In support of this position are two demonstrations where reduced task performance can be accounted for by what may
