The incentive sensitization theory suggests that repeated exposure to rewarding substances or food shapes neural circuits to create an attentional bias towards these stimuli. There is ongoing debate about whether attentional capture by such stimuli is an early automatic process or a later stage in the processing cascade. Event-related brain potentials (ERPs) provide a means to pinpoint the timing and location of attentional capture. ERPs were recorded from 28 normal weight healthy women as they attended to the left or right hemifield of a visual display while fixating a central point. Stimuli comprised bars presented left and right of the fixation point simultaneously with the task being to respond to slightly smaller bars on the attended side by button press. The bars appeared superimposed on task-irrelevant distractor stimuli (either food pictures or pictures of non-food objects). The bilateral stimuli elicited a positivity that was largest as posterior sites contralateral to the attended hemifield between 75 and 250 ms. Critically, this contralateral attention effect was enhanced by food distractors on the attended side and diminished by food distractors on the unattended side, demonstrating signs of attention capture by food stimuli as early as 80 ms poststimulus.

The Mismatch Negativity (MMN) and the P3a of the event-related EEG potential (ERP) serve as indices of prediction error detection in processing auditory stimuli. The characteristics of both components regarding the significance of the stimuli as standard or deviant have now been comprehensively described, but little is known about how these components behave during the establishment of standards or deviants. Most investigations used paradigms where the average of many instantiations of a stimulus per participant is calculated. Thus, the nascent process of establishing a stimulus as a standard stimulus, i.e., the very initial process of setting a standard, cannot be tracked. The present study used an auditory oddball task, building on a previous study using a two-tone pitch paradigm, but incorporating the speech syllables "ba" (standard) and "pa" (deviant). A rather small number of stimuli (11 deviant instantiations) was applied to a large sample of participants (> 230), to allow for ERP characterization as a function of the standard's or deviant's position in a series of standard and deviant stimuli. We found that, beginning with the fourth instantiation of the standard/deviant pair, the (new) standard was established, and no further modification of the ERP to repeated presentation of the standard stimulus could be detected. Analyzing MMN and P3a components to deviant stimuli revealed a prominent habituation of the P3a between the first and the second instantiation of the deviant, whereas no relevant habituation of the MMN could be detected, indicative of a differential MMN/P3a habituation to repeated speech-like auditory stimuli.

BACKGROUND:Previous research in cognitive science has focused on the encoding and activation of sensory-based object knowledge in the brain during language comprehension, including aspects such as appearance, movement, and taste. OBJECTIVE:To investigate how different object-related attributes affect event-related potentials (ERPs), specifically the N400 component, during word processing in an implicit task setting. METHOD:We embedded a set of 420 critical nouns within a list of 2,745 total words and asked 240 participants to read each one, but to respond only to words denoting colors. We categorized each noun by attributes such as familiarity, smell, pain, taste, sound, graspability, and motion. We focused primarily on changes in the N400 component, indicative of semantic processing, across nouns with different attributes. RESULTS:The least familiar stimuli elicited the strongest N400 response, indicating significant ERP variability across familiarity levels with more positive amplitudes for highly familiar stimuli. Among the attributes examined, only the attribute of smell demonstrated a notable, though isolated, increase in N400 amplitude. Other attributes, including pain, taste, sound, graspability, and visual motion showed no significant differences in N400 responses, suggesting a minimal influence on semantic processing in this context. CONCLUSION:These results suggest that the specific sensory attributes of objects have limited influence on the N400 component of ERPs in implicit reading tasks, highlighting the complexity of semantic networks in cognitive processing. The subtlety of ERP modulations driven by object-related attributes points to the need for further exploration into how these attributes interact within semantic networks during cognitive tasks.

This study investigates the cognitive and neural mechanisms involved in the linearization of events during language production, focusing on the processing of temporal conjunctions "before" and "after." While natural language typically presents events in chronological order, non-chronological sequences, as required by "before" sentences, impose additional cognitive demands. Using an adapted network task, we recorded event-related potentials (ERPs) in 24 healthy German speaking participants to examine the brain activity associated with these demands. Results showed that "before" sentences elicited early positivity and later negativity in ERPs, particularly over left temporal and frontocentral regions, suggesting increased working memory requirements for reordering events. These findings align with previous behavioral and neuroimaging studies, indicating that both language production and comprehension of "before" sentences necessitate more complex cognitive processing than "after" sentences. This research highlights the significant role of working memory during the conceptualization stage of language production exemplified by the brain’s handling of non-chronological sequences.

The globus pallidus internus (GPi), a critical output structure of the basal ganglia, plays a central role in motor control by facilitating or inhibiting cortical commands through its connections with the thalamus. This study investigates the involvement of the GPi and thalamus in inhibitory processes during a Go/No-Go task in six patients undergoing deep brain stimulation (DBS) for dystonia or Tourette syndrome. Local field potentials (LFPs) were recorded from externalized DBS electrodes prior to pulse generator implantation. In line with recent computational models of the basal ganglia, we hypothesized differential activity in the GPi for Go and No-Go stimuli, reflecting its role in inhibitory functions. Our findings revealed distinct averaged LFP patterns in the GPi and thalamus to Go and No-Go stimuli, and in addition pronounced differences in beta-band time-frequency activity. These findings provide direct electrophysiological evidence for the GPi's involvement in proactive inhibition which paves the way for more fine-grained analyses of inhibitory functions.

This study explores the involvement of the subthalamic nucleus (STN) in executive functions, particularly cognitive flexibility, in Parkinson's disease (PD) patients. Utilizing a computerized Wisconsin Card Sorting Task (WCST) and local field potential (LFP) recordings from implanted deep brain stimulation (DBS) electrodes, we investigated task-specific neural dynamics. Behavioural results demonstrated increased error rates and prolonged response times in trials requiring set-shifting and rule induction via cross-temporal information integration. Electrophysiological analyses revealed integration-specific LFP modulations, including enhanced theta-band activity linked to conflict monitoring and cognitive control during high-demand trials, and beta-band suppression associated with motor inhibition and task disengagement. These findings underscore the STN's integrative role in non-motor domains, supporting its function in cross-temporal information integration for cognitive control. The results also highlight the utility of the WCST for assessing multiple executive processes and the potential of LFP-based biomarkers to refine DBS programming. Despite the relatively small sample size, this study provides novel insights into the oscillatory dynamics of the STN, emphasizing its broader role in decision-making and executive control. Future research should expand the understanding of the STN's contributions across cognitive domains.

Pronouns create cohesive links in discourse by referring to previously mentioned elements. Here, we focus on pronominalization during speech production in three experiments employing ERP and fMRI methodologies. Participants were asked to produce two short sentences describing a man or woman using an object. In the second sentence, they were instructed to use a pronoun to refer to the same person and a noun to refer to a different person. The first ERP experiment revealed that noun conditions elicited more negative ERPs starting at 220 ms, with significant differences in early and later time windows, particularly in the left hemisphere. The second ERP experiment showed divergence at 280 ms, with significant differences between 300 and 400 ms at midline electrodes, again indicating more negative ERPs for nouns. The fMRI experiment identified greater activations for nouns than pronouns in regions like the superior temporal gyrus (STG) and cerebellar vermis, suggesting higher working memory load and lexical retrieval demands for nouns compared to pronouns. Moreover, pronouns elicited an enhanced centro-parietal positivity, indicating increased attentional demands. These findings suggest that while noun processing requires greater working memory and lexical retrieval, pronoun processing engages more attentional resources. This study advances our understanding of the neural mechanisms underlying pronominalization during speech production, highlighting distinct neural responses for nouns and pronouns.

Background:The rubber hand illusion (RHI) is a well-established method for studying body ownership: Given adequate concordance of visual, sensory, and proprioceptive stimuli, the individual experiences a rubber hand as his or her own.Objective:To study the effects of a threat to the rubber hand.Methods:We created a typical RHI paradigm but added threatening pain: Both the real hand of an individual and the rubber hand were stroked with a brush, either synchronously (RHI-inducing condition) or asynchronously (control condition), but only the rubber hand was then pricked with a needle to create a threatening pain condition. Event-related potentials (ERPs) were recorded in a group of 23 typically-developed individuals. ERP effects were source-localized using low-resolution electromagnetic tomography.Results:The individuals consistently reported experience of the RHI during the experiment when the brush strokes were applied synchronously to both the real hand and the rubber hand. ERP analysis revealed that synchronous brush stroking gave rise to higher amplitude of frontal ERPs in the 100-200 ms range than asynchronous brush stroking, which was interpreted as reflecting the RHI. In the threatening pain condition, ERPs showed a greater positivity at frontocentral electrodes, source localized in the supplementary motor area (SMA).Conclusion:SMA activation could reflect a control mechanism over reflexive motor activity, facilitating a possible threat-related response. Further studies should address ERP effects and the extent of the RHI to standard and threat stimuli in a correlative fashion to further elucidate the functional significance of the neurophysiological findings.

Abstract Background Motor and vocal tics are the main symptom of Gilles de la Tourette-syndrome (GTS). A particular complex vocal tic comprises the utterance of swear words, termed coprolalia. Since taboo words are socially inappropriate, they are normally suppressed by people, which implies cognitive control processes. Method To investigate the control of the unintentional pronunciation of taboo words and the associated processes of conflict monitoring, we used the “Spoonerisms of Laboratory Induced Predisposition” (SLIP) paradigm. Participants read multiple inductor word pairs with the same phonemes, followed by pronouncing a target pair with inverse phonemes. This led to a conflict between two competing speech plans: the correct word pair and the word pair with inverted phonemes. Latter speech error, a spoonerism, could result in a neutral or taboo word. We investigated 19 patients with GTS and 23 typically developed controls (TDC) and measured participants’ electroencephalography (EEG) during the SLIP task. Results At the behavioral level less taboo than neutral word spoonerisms occurred in both groups without significant differences. Event-related brain potentials (ERP) revealed a difference between taboo and neutral word conditions in the GTS group at the midline electrodes in a time range of 250–400 ms after the speech prompt, which was not found in the TDC group. The extent of this effect depended on the number of inductor word pairs, suggesting an increasing level of cognitive control in the GTS group. Conclusion The differences between taboo and neutral word conditions in patients with GTS compared to TDC suggest an altered recruitment of cognitive control processes in GTS, likely enlisted to suppress taboo words.

Summary Zusätzlich zur klassischen Musiktherapie konnten Behandelnde mit der musikunterstützten Therapie (MST) bei Parkinson- und Schlaganfallpatient*innen gute Erfolge erzielen. Hierbei handelt es sich um strukturiertes Trainingsprogramm mit Keyboard- und Trommelübungen zur Verbesserung der motorischen Funktionen der oberen Gliedmaßen. Randomisierte kontrollierte Studien belegen die Wirksamkeit. Musikalische ­Interventionen können die Mobilität der oberen Gliedmaßen sowohl bei subakuten als auch bei chronischen Schlaganfallpatien­t*innen verbessern. Musikbasierte Interventionen, die auf rhythmischer Stimulation beruhen, haben bei Parkinson-Patient*innen einen positiven Einfluss auf die Gehgeschwindigkeit, die Schrittlänge und die Mobilität.

Obesity represents a significant public health concern and is linked to various comorbidities and cognitive impairments. Previous research indicates that elevated body mass index (BMI) is associated with structural changes in white matter (WM). However, a deeper characterization of body composition is required, especially considering the links between abdominal obesity and metabolic dysfunction. This study aims to enhance our understanding of the relationship between obesity and WM connectivity by directly assessing the amount and distribution of fat tissue. Whole-body magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) was employed to evaluate total adipose tissue (TAT), visceral adipose tissue (VAT), and subcutaneous adipose tissue (SAT), while MR liver spectroscopy measured liver fat content in 63 normal-weight, overweight, and obese males. WM connectivity was quantified using microstructure-informed tractography. Connectome-based predictive modeling was used to predict body composition metrics based on WM connectomes. Our analysis revealed a positive dependency between BMI, TAT, SAT, and WM connectivity in brain regions involved in reward processing and appetite regulation, such as the insula, nucleus accumbens, and orbitofrontal cortex. Increased connectivity was also observed in cognitive control and inhibition networks, including the middle frontal gyrus and anterior cingulate cortex. No significant associations were found between WM connectivity and VAT or liver fat. Our findings suggest that altered neural communication between these brain regions may affect cognitive processes, emotional regulation, and reward perception in individuals with obesity, potentially contributing to weight gain. While our study did not identify a link between WM connectivity and VAT or liver fat, further investigation of the role of various fat depots and metabolic factors in brain networks is required to advance obesity prevention and treatment approaches.

To investigate changes in brain network organization and possible neurobehavioral similarities to attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), we measured changes in brain resting-state functional connectivity (rs-fMRI) and cognitive domains in patients with resistance to thyroid hormone β (RTHβ) and compared them with those in healthy control subjects. In this prospective case-control study, twenty-one participants with genetically confirmed RTHβ were matched with 21 healthy controls. The Adult ADHD Self-Report Scale (ASRS-v1.1) and ADHD Rating Scale-IV were used to assess self-reported symptoms of ADHD. A voxel-wise and atlas-based approach was used to identify changes in the brain networks. The RTHβ group reported behavioral symptoms similar to those of ADHD. We found evidence of weaker network integration of the lingual and fusiform gyri in the RTHβ group, which was mainly driven by weaker connectivity to the bilateral insula and supplementary motor cortex. Functional connectivity between regions of the default mode network (angular gyrus/middle temporal gyrus) and regions of the cognitive control network (bilateral middle frontal gyrus) was increased in RTHβ patients compared to healthy controls. Increased connectivity between regions of the default mode network and the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex is frequently reported in ADHD and is interpreted to be associated with deficits in attention. Our finding of weaker connectivity of the lingual gyrus to the bilateral insula (salience network) in RTHβ patients has also been reported previously in ADHD and may reflect decreased habituation to visual stimuli and increased distractibility. Overall, our observations support the notion of neuropsychological similarities between RTHβ and ADHD.

Error detection in typing is crucial for assessing the adequacy of ongoing actions, leveraging both predictive mechanisms for early detection and sensory feedback for late detection. Neurophysiological studies have supported the anticipation of errors through predictive models. This research extends the understanding of error detection in typing, focusing on the neurocognitive mechanisms underlying errors in transparent and intransparent German words. Thirty-six volunteer students typed out aurally presented words, classified as either orthographically transparent or intransparent, on a computer keyboard without the possibility of correction. Because of poor spelling or excessive artifacts, the final sample comprised 27 participants. Event-related potentials (ERPs) were obtained time-locked to key presses, and behavioral data on typing correctness and speed were collected. A higher error rate and longer latency for intransparent words compared to transparent ones were found, suggesting the complexity of spelling impacts typing correctness. Post-error slowing was observed, aligning with increased cognitive control following errors. ERPs revealed a negative component akin to the error-related negativity (ERN) for typing errors, with a pronounced ERN-like negativity preceding erroneous key-presses, particularly for intransparent words. The study provides evidence of the cognitive and neural mechanisms underlying typing errors, highlighting the impact of orthographic transparency. The detection of an ERN-like negativity before erroneous key-presses, especially in typing intransparent words, underscores the brain's use of predictive mechanisms for error detection.

Explicit logical reasoning, like transitive inference, is a hallmark of human intelligence. This study investigated cortical oscillations and their interactions in transitive inference with EEG. Participants viewed premises describing abstract relations among items. They accurately recalled the relationship between old pairs of items, effectively inferred the relationship between new pairs of items, and discriminated between true and false relationships for new pairs. First, theta (4-7 Hz) and alpha oscillations (8-15 Hz) had distinct functional roles. Frontal theta oscillations distinguished between new and old pairs, reflecting the inference of new information. Parietal alpha oscillations changed with serial position and symbolic distance of the pairs, representing the underlying relational structure. Frontal alpha oscillations distinguished between true and false pairs, linking the new information with the underlying relational structure. Second, theta and alpha oscillations interacted through cross-frequency and inter-regional phase synchronization. Frontal theta-alpha 1:2 phase locking appeared to coordinate spectrally diverse neural activity, enhanced for new versus old pairs and true versus false pairs. Alpha-band frontal-parietal phase coherence appeared to coordinate anatomically distributed neural activity, enhanced for new versus old pairs and false versus true pairs. It suggests that cross-frequency and inter-regional phase synchronization among theta and alpha oscillations supports human transitive inference.

Background Patients with Parkinson’s disease (PD) have been reported to exhibit unusual bouts of creativity (e.g., painting, writing), in particular in the context of treatment with dopaminergic agents. Here we investigated divergent and convergent thinking thought to underlie creativity. In addition we assessed cognitive estimation. Method Twenty PD patients and 20 matched healthy control participants were subjected to the Guilford Alternate Uses task (divergent thinking), the remote associates task (convergent thinking) and two tests of cognitive estimation. Results No group differences were found for the convergent thinking task, while the Guilford Alternate Uses task revealed a decreased number of correct responses and a reduced originality for PD patients. Originality in PD was correlated to total daily dose of dopaminergic medication. Moreover, both tasks of cognitive estimation showed an impairment in PD. Conclusion Only minor effects were found for psychometric indices of subprocesses of creative thinking, while estimation, relying on executive functioning, is impaired in PD. We suggest to take a product oriented view of creativity in further research on altered creative processes in PD.

The growing global obesity issue emphasizes the importance of understanding its health implications. Previous research has identified consistent alterations in gray matter (GM) volume in connection with obesity. Given the various implications of distinct fat compartments and the potential role of adipose tissue-derived adipokines in brain health, a more detailed investigation of adiposity is required. This study investigates a sample of 65 males with varying body mass indices to explore the relationship between various fat compartments, adipokine levels, and volumetric GM variations, aiming to provide a deeper understanding of the interplay between adiposity, brain structure, and metabolic signals. Whole-body magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) was used to assess total, visceral, and subcutaneous adipose tissue, while MR spectroscopy was performed to capture liver fat content. For the assessment of adipokine levels leptin and adiponectin concentrations were measured, and structural brain images underwent cortical and subcortical segmentation for GM volume and thickness. A predictive modeling approach with leave-one-out cross-validation was used to predict body composition metrics and adipokine levels based on structural GM data. Our investigation revealed diminished GM volume and thickness correlated with elevated leptin levels in areas crucial for appetite regulation, decision-making, and cognitive control, including the anterior insula, orbitofrontal cortex, and anterior cingulate cortex. These findings suggest a potential adverse impact of heightened leptin concentrations on brain health and eating habits. Contrary to expectations, our investigation found no significant relationship between GM volume and any of the measured fat compartments. This result prompts the need for further research to elucidate the relationship between obesity, adipokines, and brain structure.

The mismatch negativity and the P3a of the event-related EEG potential reflect the electrocortical response to a deviant stimulus in a series of stimuli. Although both components have been investigated in various paradigms, these paradigms usually incorporate many repetitions of the same deviant, thus leaving open whether both components vary as a function of the deviant's position in a series of deviant stimuli-i.e. whether they are subject to qualitative/quantitative habituation from one instantiation of a deviant to the next. This is so because the detection of mismatch negativity/P3a in the event-related EEG potential requires an averaging over dozens or hundreds of stimuli, i.e. over many instantiations of the deviant per participant. The present study addresses this research gap. We used a two-tone oddball paradigm implementing only a small number of (deviant) stimuli per participant, but applying it to a large number of participants (n > 230). Our data show that the mismatch negativity amplitude exhibits no decrease as a function of the deviant's position in a series of (standard and) deviant stimuli. Importantly, only after the very first deviant stimulus, a distinct P3a could be detected, indicative of an orienting reaction and an attention shift, and thus documenting a dissociation of mismatch negativity and P3a.

Background: Impulsivity resulting in unrestrained eating has been implicated as a contributing factor for obesity. Delay discounting (DD) tasks where individuals choose between a smaller immediate reward and a larger delayed reward provide useful data to describe impulsive decision-making and to determine the extent to which delayed rewards are discounted. Objective: To study the association between body mass index(BMI) and delay discounting for food and money in adult women. Methods: We used a DD task with real food rewards to investigate impulsive decision-making as related to BMI in participants who self-identified as women. Participants in group A had a mean BMI of 21.4 (n = 14), and participants in group B had a mean BMI of 32.2 (n = 14). Each group was tested in a hungry state during a single session. We performed fMRI during a DD task requiring participants to choose between a food item (one sandwich) constituting a smaller immediate reward and multiple food items (two, three, or four sandwiches) constituting a series of larger delayed rewards available at different intervals. The steepness of the discounting curve for food was determined from these decisions. Participants then completed a monetary discounting task to facilitate a comparison of the discounting of food and monetary rewards. Results: Participants in group B discounted food rewards more steeply than monetary rewards. Decisions for delayed rewards led to increased activations of brain areas related to executive control on fMRI, such as the head of the caudate nucleus and the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) in group A, but not group B participants. Conclusion: Our findings suggest that group B had difficulty deciding against the immediate food rewards due to insufficient recruitment of cortical control areas. Therefore, impulsivity is an important target for behavioral interventions in individuals with obesity.

Background Reduplicative paramnesia (RP) is a delusional misidentification syndrome first described by Arnold Pick in which individuals believe they are in a duplicate location. RP can manifest as place reduplication, chimeric assimilation, or confabulatory mislocation, with parallels to person misidentification syndromes like Capgras and Fregoli. Though associated with various conditions, stroke-induced lesions are the most common cause, as evidenced by studies identifying brain network disruptions linked to RP. Case presentation This case study involves a 71-year-old hypertensive male who presented with a right-sided caudate nucleus hemorrhage, leading to intensive care, ventricular drainage, and rehabilitation. Fourteen months post-stroke, the patient exhibited delusional beliefs that his apartment had been swapped with a similar one in another town. Comprehensive neuropsychological assessment and advanced neuroimaging were performed to elucidate the underlying neural correlates. Neuropsychological testing revealed normal verbal memory and interference control but significant deficits in spatial perception and memory for geometrical shapes. Neuroimaging identified a lesion centered upon the right caudate nucleus, consistent with structural disconnection maps associated with RP. Conclusions This case highlights RP as complication following stroke, in this case due to functional disconnection of frontal and temporal regions on the right hemisphere. The findings underscore the importance of considering RP in differential diagnoses of post-stroke confusion and the potential utility of advanced imaging techniques in identifying at-risk patients.

Background and Objective:Implicit social cognition refers to attitudes and stereotypes that may reside outside conscious awareness and control but that still affect human behavior. In particular, the implicit favoritism of an ingroup, to which an individual belongs, as opposed to an outgroup, to which the individual does not belong, characterized as ingroup bias, is of interest and is investigated here.Method:We used a Go/NoGo association task (GNAT) and behavioral and electroencephalographic (event-related EEG potential [ERP] analysis) measures to investigate the implicit bias toward cities in East Germany, West Germany, and Europe, in 16 individuals each from West and East Germany (mixed gender, Mage = 24). The GNAT assesses an individual's Go and NoGo responses for a given association between a target category and either pole (positive or negative) of an evaluative dimension.Results:Behavioral measures revealed slightly faster reaction times to the combination of European city names and negative, as compared with positive, evaluative words in both groups. ERP analysis showed an increased negativity at 400-800 ms poststimulus in the incongruent conditions of East German city/positive word pairings (in West Germans) and West German city/positive word pairings (in East Germans).Conclusion:An implicitly moderately negative evaluation of Europe by both groups was exhibited based on the behavioral data, and an increased level of conflict arising from the "incongruent" pairings (ie, as manifestation of an implicitly negative attitude toward East Germany in West Germans, and toward West Germany in East Germans) was exhibited based on the electrophysiological data.