scholarly journals Reconciling fMRI and EEG indices of attentional modulations in human visual cortex

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sirawaj Itthipuripat ◽  
Thomas C Sprague ◽  
John T Serences

AbstractFunctional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and electroencephalography (EEG) are the two most popular non-invasive methods used to study the neural mechanisms underlying human cognition. These approaches are considered complementary: fMRI has higher spatial resolution but sluggish temporal resolution, whereas EEG has millisecond temporal resolution, but only at a broad spatial scale. Beyond the obvious fact that fMRI measures properties of blood and EEG measures changes in electric fields, many foundational studies assume that, aside from differences in spatial and temporal precision, these two methods index the same underlying neural modulations. We tested this assumption by using EEG and fMRI to measure attentional modulations of neural responses to stimuli of different visual contrasts. We found that equivalent experiments performed using fMRI and EEG on the same participants revealed remarkably different patterns of attentional modulations: event-related fMRI responses provided evidence for an additive increase in responses across all contrasts equally, whereas early stimulus-evoked event-related potentials (ERPs) showed larger modulations with increasing stimulus contrast and only a later negative-going ERP and low-frequency oscillatory EEG signals showed effects similar to fMRI. These results demonstrate that there is not a one-to-one correspondence between the physiological mechanisms that give rise to modulations of fMRI responses and the most commonly used ERP markers, and that the typical approach of employing fMRI and EEG to gain complementary information about localization and temporal dynamics is over-simplified. Instead, fMRI and EEG index different physiological modulations and their joint application affords synergistic insights into the neural mechanisms supporting human cognition.

Entropy ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 23 (11) ◽  
pp. 1547
Author(s):  
Karina Maciejewska ◽  
Wojciech Froelich

Research on the functioning of human cognition has been a crucial problem studied for years. Electroencephalography (EEG) classification methods may serve as a precious tool for understanding the temporal dynamics of human brain activity, and the purpose of such an approach is to increase the statistical power of the differences between conditions that are too weak to be detected using standard EEG methods. Following that line of research, in this paper, we focus on recognizing gender differences in the functioning of the human brain in the attention task. For that purpose, we gathered, analyzed, and finally classified event-related potentials (ERPs). We propose a hierarchical approach, in which the electrophysiological signal preprocessing is combined with the classification method, enriched with a segmentation step, which creates a full line of electrophysiological signal classification during an attention task. This approach allowed us to detect differences between men and women in the P3 waveform, an ERP component related to attention, which were not observed using standard ERP analysis. The results provide evidence for the high effectiveness of the proposed method, which outperformed a traditional statistical analysis approach. This is a step towards understanding neuronal differences between men’s and women’s brains during cognition, aiming to reduce the misdiagnosis and adverse side effects in underrepresented women groups in health and biomedical research.


2018 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jona Sassenhagen ◽  
Ryan Blything ◽  
Elena V. M. Lieven ◽  
Ben Ambridge

How are verb-argument structure preferences acquired? Children typically receive very little negative evidence, raising the question of how they come to understand the restrictions on grammatical constructions. Statistical learning theories propose stochastic patterns in the input contain sufficient clues. For example, if a verb is very common, but never observed in transitive constructions, this would indicate that transitive usage of that verb is illegal. Ambridge et al. (2008) have shown that in offline grammaticality judgements of intransitive verbs used in transitive constructions, low-frequency verbs elicit higher acceptability ratings than high-frequency verbs, as predicted if relative frequency is a cue during statistical learning. Here, we investigate if the same pattern also emerges in on-line processing of English sentences. EEG was recorded while healthy adults listened to sentences featuring transitive uses of semantically matched verb pairs of differing frequencies. We replicate the finding of higher acceptabilities of transitive uses of low- vs. high-frequency intransitive verbs. Event-Related Potentials indicate a similar result: early electrophysiological signals distinguish between misuse of high- vs low-frequency verbs. This indicates online processing shows a similar sensitivity to frequency as off-line judgements, consistent with a parser that reflects an original acquisition of grammatical constructions via statistical cues. However, the nature of the observed neural responses was not of the expected, or an easily interpretable, form, motivating further work into neural correlates of online processing of syntactic constructions.


2015 ◽  
Vol 27 (3) ◽  
pp. 492-508 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nicholas E. Myers ◽  
Lena Walther ◽  
George Wallis ◽  
Mark G. Stokes ◽  
Anna C. Nobre

Working memory (WM) is strongly influenced by attention. In visual WM tasks, recall performance can be improved by an attention-guiding cue presented before encoding (precue) or during maintenance (retrocue). Although precues and retrocues recruit a similar frontoparietal control network, the two are likely to exhibit some processing differences, because precues invite anticipation of upcoming information whereas retrocues may guide prioritization, protection, and selection of information already in mind. Here we explored the behavioral and electrophysiological differences between precueing and retrocueing in a new visual WM task designed to permit a direct comparison between cueing conditions. We found marked differences in ERP profiles between the precue and retrocue conditions. In line with precues primarily generating an anticipatory shift of attention toward the location of an upcoming item, we found a robust lateralization in late cue-evoked potentials associated with target anticipation. Retrocues elicited a different pattern of ERPs that was compatible with an early selection mechanism, but not with stimulus anticipation. In contrast to the distinct ERP patterns, alpha-band (8–14 Hz) lateralization was indistinguishable between cue types (reflecting, in both conditions, the location of the cued item). We speculate that, whereas alpha-band lateralization after a precue is likely to enable anticipatory attention, lateralization after a retrocue may instead enable the controlled spatiotopic access to recently encoded visual information.


2014 ◽  
Vol 29 (8) ◽  
pp. 463-472 ◽  
Author(s):  
S. Corbera ◽  
S. Ikezawa ◽  
M.D. Bell ◽  
B.E. Wexler

AbstractEmpathy is crucial for maintaining effective social interactions. Research has identified both an early-emotional sharing and a late-cognitive component of empathy. Although considered a functionally vital social cognition process, empathy has scarcely been studied in schizophrenia (SZ). We used event-related potentials (ERPs) to study the temporal dynamics of empathic response in 19 patients with SZ and 18 matched healthy controls (HC) using an empathy for physical pain paradigm. Participants responded to pictures of hands in neutral and painful situations in an active empathic condition and one manipulated by task demands. Additionally, subjective ratings of the stimuli and empathic self-reports were collected. People with SZ had (1) decreased early-emotional ERP responses to pictures of others in pain; (2) decreased modulation by attention of late-cognitive ERP responses; (3) lower ratings of perspective taking and higher ratings of personal distress which were both related to decreased modulation of late-cognitive empathic responses; (4) a significant relationship between high affective overlap between somebody else's pain and their own pain and decreased modulation of late-cognitive empathic responses; (5) a distinct relationship between regulatory deficits in late-cognitive empathy and functioning. Patients had present but reduced early and late empathy-related ERPs. Patients also reported increased personal distress when faced with distress in others. The late ERP responses are thought to be associated with self-regulation and response modulation. The magnitude of these late responses was inversely associated with reported levels of personal distress in both patients and controls. Additionally, regulatory deficits in cognitive empathy were highly related with deficits in functioning. Decreased ability to regulate one's own emotional engagement and response to emotions of others may be an important source of distress and dysfunction in social situations for patients with schizophrenia.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tzu-Yu Hsu ◽  
Tzu-Ling Liu ◽  
Paul Z. Cheng ◽  
Hsin-Chien Lee ◽  
Timothy J. Lane ◽  
...  

AbstractBackgroundRumination, a tendency to focus on negative self-related thoughts, is a central symptom of depression. Studying the self-related aspect of such symptoms is challenging due to the need to distinguish self effects per se from the emotional content of task stimuli. This study employs an emotionally neutral self-related paradigm to investigate possible altered self processing in depression and its link to rumination.MethodsPeople with unipolar depression (MDD; n = 25) and controls (n = 25) underwent task-based EEG recording. Late event-related potentials were studied along with low frequency oscillatory power. EEG metrics were compared between groups and correlated with depressive symptoms and reported rumination.ResultsThe MDD group displayed a difference in late potentials across fronto-central electrodes between self-related and non-self-related conditions. No such difference was seen in controls. The magnitude of this difference was positively related with depressive symptoms and reported rumination. MDD also had elevated theta oscillation power at central electrodes in self-related conditions, which was not seen in controls.ConclusionsRumination appears linked to altered self-related processing in depression, independently of stimuli-related emotional confounds. This connection between self-related processing and depression may point to self-disorder being a core component of the condition.


Author(s):  
Robert West

Life is filled with goals or intentions that people hope to realize. Some of these are rather mundane (e.g., remembering to purchase a key ingredient for a recipe when stopping at the market), while others are more significant (e.g., remembering to pick up one’s child from school at the end of the day). Prospective memory represents the ability to form and then realize intentions at an appropriate time. A fundamental aspect of prospective memory is that one is engaged in one or more tasks (i.e., ongoing activities) between the formation of an intention and the opportunity to realize the goal. For instance, in the shopping example, one might form the intention at home and then travel to the market and collect several other items before walking past the desired ingredient. Considerable research has demonstrated that the efficiency of prospective memory declines with age, although age-related differences are not universal. The neurocognitive processes underpinning age-related differences in the formation and realization of delayed intentions have been investigated in studies using event-related brain potentials. This research reveals that age-related differences in prospective memory arise from the disruption of neural systems supporting the successful encoding of intentions, the detection of prospective memory cues, and possibly processes supporting the retrieval of intentions from memory when a cue is encountered or efficiently shifting from the ongoing activity to the prospective element of the task. Therefore, strategies designed to ameliorate age-related declines in prospective memory should target a variety of processes engaged during the encoding, retrieval, and enactment of delayed intentions.


2020 ◽  
Vol 30 (9) ◽  
pp. 4914-4921
Author(s):  
Minkyung Park ◽  
Myung Hun Jung ◽  
Jiyoon Lee ◽  
A Ruem Choi ◽  
Sun Ju Chung ◽  
...  

Abstract The ability to detect and correct errors is a critical aspect of human cognition. Neuronal dysfunction in error processing has been reported in addictive disorders. The aim of this study was to investigate neural systems underlying error processing using event-related potentials (ERPs) and current source localization as well as neurocognitive executive function tests in patients with Internet gaming disorder (IGD). A total of 68 individuals (34 patients with IGD and 34 healthy controls [HCs]) were included, and two ERP components, error-related negativity (ERN) and error positivity (Pe), were extracted during a GoNogo task. Patients with IGD exhibited significantly reduced ERN and Pe amplitudes compared with HCs. Standardized low-resolution brain electromagnetic tomography (sLORETA) in between-group comparisons revealed that patients with IGD had decreased source activations of the Pe component in the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) under the Nogo condition. These ERP changes were associated with deficits in decision-making and response inhibition in IGD patients. The results suggest that IGD may be associated with functional abnormalities in the ACC and alterations in neural activity related to both the early unconscious and the later conscious stages of error processing, as well as deficits in area of decision-making.


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