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Background: The evaluation of evidence, which frequently takes the form of scientific evidence, necessitates the input of experts in relevant fields. The results are presented as expert opinions or expert evaluations, which are generally accepted as a reliable representation of the facts. A further issue that remains unresolved though is the process of evaluating the expertise and knowledge of an expert in the first instance. In general, earned certificates, grades and other objective criteria are typically regarded as representative documentation to substantiate an expert status. However, there is a possibility that these may not always be sufficiently representative. Objectives: The goal of the present study was to provide evidence that the neural processing of law-relevant and law-irrelevant terms varies significantly between participants who have received training in the field of law (experts) and those who have not (novices). Methods: To this end, changes in brain activity were recorded via electroencephalography (EEG) during visual presentations of terms belonging to five different categories (fake right, democracy, filler word, basic right and rule of law). Event-related potentials (ERPs) were subsequently averaged for each category and subjected to statistical analysis. Results: The results clearly demonstrate that participants trained in law processed fake rights and filler words in a similar manner. Furthermore, both of these conditions elicited different levels of brain activity compared to all law-relevant terms. This was not the case in participants who had not received legal training. The brains of untrained participants processed all five term categories in a strikingly similar manner. In light of prior knowledge regarding language processing, the primary focus was on two distinct electrode locations: one in the left posterior region, and the other in the left frontal region. In both locations, the most prominent differences in brain activity elicited by the aforementioned term categories in law-trained participants occurred approximately 450 milliseconds after stimulus onset. The results were further corroborated by a repeated-measures ANOVA and subsequent t-tests, which also demonstrated the absence of this effect in law-untrained participants. Conclusions: The findings of this study provide empirical evidence that brain activity measurements, in particular ERPs, can be used to distinguish between experts trained in a specific field of expertise and novices in that field. Such findings have the potential to facilitate objective assessments of expertise, enabling comparisons between experts and novices that extend beyond traditional criteria such as qualifications and experience. Instead, individuals can be evaluated based on their cognitive processes, as observed through brain activity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A tactile event-related potential (ERP)-based brain–computer interface (BCI) system is an alternative for enhancing the control and communication abilities of quadriplegic patients with visual or auditory impairments. Hence, in this study, we proposed a tactile stimulus pattern using a vibrotactile stimulator for a multicommand BCI system. Additionally, we observed a tactile ERP response to the target from random vibrotactile stimuli placed in the left and right wrist and elbow positions to create commands. An experiment was conducted to explore the location of the proposed vibrotactile stimulus and to verify the multicommand tactile ERP-based BCI system. Using the proposed features and conventional classification methods, we examined the classification efficiency of the four commands created from the selected EEG channels. The results show that the proposed vibrotactile stimulation with 15 stimulus trials produced a prominent ERP response in the Pz channels. The average classification accuracy ranged from 61.9% to 79.8% over 15 stimulus trials, requiring 36 s per command in offline processing. The P300 response in the parietal area yielded the highest average classification accuracy. The proposed method can guide the development of a brain–computer interface system for physically disabled people with visual or auditory impairments to control assistive and rehabilitative devices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Color vision deficiency (CVD) is one of the most common disorders related to visual impairment. Individuals with this condition are unable to differentiate between colors due to the absence or impairment of one or more color photoreceptors in their retinas. This disorder can be diagnosed through multiple approaches. This review paper provides a comprehensive summary of studies on applying Brain–Computer Interface (BCI) technology for diagnosing CVD. The main purpose of this review is to help researchers understand how BCI can be further developed and utilized for diagnosing CVD in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Packaging design is pivotal in motivating consumer decisions, as a key communication tool from creation to purchase. Currently, the interpretation and evaluation of packaging's impact are shifting toward non-traditional methods. This pilot study evaluated the packaging perception of York Ham and Turkey Breast products. The event-related potential (ERP) technique, the methodology priming words (positive and negative), and target images (original and modified packaging) were applied. A total of 23 participants were sampled using a 32-channels scalp elastic electrode cap and viewed 200 trials of word–image matching. Participants responded whether the images and adjectives matched or not, using the two groups of images. The results demonstrate an N400 effect in the parietal area. This region was observed to show evidence of cognitive processing related to congruency or incongruency, by contrasting the priming and target of this study. The evaluation positioned the York Ham packaging as the best rated. The findings show a relevant contribution to ERPs and research related to the food packaging perception. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rapid serial visual presentation (RSVP) is currently a suitable gaze-independent paradigm for controlling visual brain–computer interfaces (BCIs) based on event-related potentials (ERPs), especially for users with limited eye movement control. However, unlike gaze-dependent paradigms, gaze-independent ones have received less attention concerning the specific choice of visual stimuli that are used. In gaze-dependent BCIs, images of faces—particularly those tinted red—have been shown to be effective stimuli. This study aims to evaluate whether the colour of faces used as visual stimuli influences ERP-BCI performance under RSVP. Fifteen participants tested four conditions that varied only in the visual stimulus used: grey letters (GL), red famous faces with letters (RFF), green famous faces with letters (GFF), and blue famous faces with letters (BFF). The results indicated significant accuracy differences only between the GL and GFF conditions, unlike prior gaze-dependent studies. Additionally, GL achieved higher comfort ratings compared with other face-related conditions. This study highlights that the choice of stimulus type impacts both performance and user comfort, suggesting implications for future ERP-BCI designs for users requiring gaze-independent systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study employs event-related potential (ERP) to examine the impact of empathic concern on prosocial decision-making with costs in both gain and loss contexts. In this experiment, participants can choose between two types of lottery tickets and pay lottery money to help the target person gain more money or lose less money. The behavioral results showed that regardless of the context of the decision (financial loss or gain), participants tended to help individuals who had induced high empathic concern. ERP results show that compared to the low-empathic-concern condition, the high-empathic-concern condition induced greater P3 amplitude in the gain context. However, this change in P3 amplitude caused by empathic concern did not occur in the context of loss. These findings indicate that empathic concern has different psychological mechanisms that moderate prosocial behavior in gain and loss contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Trust and distrust are constructs that have provoked and undergone lots of discussion in the fields of sociology and psychology. However, to our knowledge, there is little agreement about how these constructs should be treated in the future. The present study tries to help in this discussion by re-analyzing prior neurophysiological data highlighting differences between trust and distrust by connecting these data with two distinct personality dimensions. Thus, the objective was to analyze the connection between neurophysiological trust/distrust processing and distinct HEXACO personality dimensions. Differences were found in the event-related potentials (ERPs) calculated for visual presentations of political institution words and brand names, which were evaluated with respect to trust and distrust by button presses. Two time points (330 ms and 780 ms) showed brain activity differences between trust and distrust related to the two word categories at frontal electrode locations. For this study, these findings were taken and connected to HEXACO-60 personality inventory results collected from prior participants. Statistical analysis revealed a significant interaction between the ERPs and two HEXACO personality dimensions concerning trusted brands at the later time point (780 ms) at the right frontal electrode location F8. This result is taken as neurophysiological evidence that parameter values of the personality traits honesty–humility and agreeableness have an influence on brain functions related to trusted brands. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The birth and following growth of social media platforms has influenced a lot. In addition to beneficial features, it has long-been noticed that heavy consumption of social media can have negative effects beyond a simple lack of time for other things. Of particular interest is the idea that consuming short videos lasting only fractions of a minute and watched one after another can lead to deficits in concentration and attention. Completing the existing literature that already reports evidence for attention deficits related to heavy social media use, the present study aims to contribute to this acute topic by adding neurophysiological data to it. In particular, this study made use of a well-known experimental paradigm, which is able to detect attention-related changes on a neurophysiological level. The so-called oddball paradigm was applied and the hypothesis that heavy social media users mainly consuming short videos show a reduced P300 event-related potential (ERP) component was tested, which has been found to reflect attention-related brain functions. For this, we invited twenty-nine participants and designed a visual oddball experiment including a white circle on black background as the low-frequency target stimulus and a white triangle on black background as the high-frequency non-target stimulus. On the basis of their self-reported short-video-based social media usage habits, all participants were grouped into heavy (more than 4 h daily usage) and regular (below 3 h daily usage) users, and finally data from 14 heavy and 15 regular users were further analyzed. It was found that only regular users show a clear P300 ERP component, while this particular brain potential amplitude reflecting attentional processes was significantly reduced in heavy users. This result provides empirical brain imaging evidence that heavy short-video-based social media use indeed affects attentional brain processes in a negative way. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The G2019S-LRRK2 gene mutation is a common cause of hereditary Parkinson's disease (PD), associated with a higher frequency of the postural instability gait difficulty (PIGD) motor phenotype yet with preserved cognition. This study investigated neurophysiological changes during motor and cognitive tasks in PD patients with and without the G2019S-LRRK2 mutation. Methods: 33 iPD patients and 22 LRRK2-PD patients performed the visual Go/NoGo task (VGNG) during sitting (single-task) and walking (dual-task) while wearing a 64-channel EEG cap. Event-related potentials (ERP) from Fz and Pz, specifically N200 and P300, were extracted and analyzed to quantify brain activity patterns. Results: The LRRK2-PD group performed better in the VGNG than the iPD group (group*task; p = 0.05). During Go, the iPD group showed reduced N2 amplitude and prolonged N2 latency during walking, whereas the LRRK2-PD group showed only shorter latency (group*task p = 0.027). During NoGo, opposite patterns emerged; the iPD group showed reduced N2 and increased P3 amplitudes during walking while the LRRK2-PD group demonstrated increased N2 and reduced P3 (N2: group*task, p = 0.010, P3: group*task, p = 0.012). Conclusions: The LRRK2-PD group showed efficient early cognitive processes, reflected by N2, resulting in greater neural synchronization and prominent ERPs. These processes are possibly the underlying mechanisms for the observed better cognitive performance as compared to the iPD group. As such, future applications of intelligent medical sensing should be capable of capturing these electrophysiological patterns in order to enhance motor–cognitive functions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Individuals often measure their performance through social comparison. With the increase in the deviation degree between the self and others, the outcome evaluation of individuals' abilities in the social comparison context is still unknown. In the current study, we used a two self-outcomes × three others' outcomes within-participant design to investigate the effect of the deviation degree of the self versus others in the social comparison context. Event-related potentials (ERPs) were measured while participants performed a three-person dot estimation task with two other people. When participants received positive results, the amplitudes of feedback-related negativity (FRN) and P300 showed a significant gradient change in the degree of deviation between the self and others (even win vs. better win vs. best win conditions). However, we did not find a similar progressive effect when participants received negative results (even loss vs. worse loss vs. worst loss conditions). These findings suggest that the deviation degree affects the primary and later processing stages of social comparison outcomes only when individuals received positive outcomes, which may reflect how people develop an empathic response to others. In contrast, people tended to avoid deeper social comparison that threatened their self-esteem when they received negative outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An event-related potential (ERP)-based brain–computer interface (BCI) can be used to monitor a user's cognitive state during a surveillance task in a situational awareness context. The present study explores the use of an ERP-BCI for detecting new planes in an air traffic controller (ATC). Two experiments were conducted to evaluate the impact of different visual factors on target detection. Experiment 1 validated the type of stimulus used and the effect of not knowing its appearance location in an ERP-BCI scenario. Experiment 2 evaluated the effect of the size of the target stimulus appearance area and the stimulus salience in an ATC scenario. The main results demonstrate that the size of the plane appearance area had a negative impact on the detection performance and on the amplitude of the P300 component. Future studies should address this issue to improve the performance of an ATC in stimulus detection using an ERP-BCI. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Especially for young people, influencers and other celebrities followed on social media evoke affective closeness that in their young minds seems real even though it is fake. Such fake friendships are potentially problematic because of their felt reality on the consumer side while lacking any inversely felt true closeness. The question arises if the unilateral friendship of a social media user is equal or at least similar to real reciprocal friendship. Instead of asking social media users for explicit responses (conscious deliberation), the present exploratory study aimed to answer this question with the help of brain imaging technology. Thirty young participants were first invited to provide individual lists including (i) twenty names of their most followed and loved influencers or other celebrities (fake friend names), (ii) twenty names of loved real friends and relatives (real friend names) as well as (iii) twenty names they do not feel any closeness to (no friend names). They then came to the Freud CanBeLab (Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience and Behavior Lab) where they were shown their selected names in a random sequence (two rounds), while their brain activities were recorded via electroencephalography (EEG) and later calculated into event-related potentials (ERPs). We found short (ca. 100 ms) left frontal brain activity starting at around 250 ms post-stimulus to process real friend and no friend names similarly, while both ERPs differed from those elicited by fake friend names. This is followed by a longer effect (ca. 400 ms), where left and right frontal and temporoparietal ERPs also differed between fake and real friend names, but at this later processing stage, no friend names elicited similar brain activities to fake friend names in those regions. In general, real friend names elicited the most negative going brain potentials (interpreted as highest brain activation levels). These exploratory findings represent objective empirical evidence that the human brain clearly distinguishes between influencers or other celebrities and close people out of real life even though subjective feelings of closeness and trust can be similar. In summary, brain imaging shows there is nothing like a real friend. The findings of this study might be seen as a starting point for future studies using ERPs to investigate social media impact and topics such as fake friendship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Precise timing prediction (TP) enables the brain to accurately predict the occurrence of upcoming events in millisecond timescale, which is fundamental for adaptive behaviors. The neural effect of the TP within a single sensory modality has been widely studied. However, less is known about how precise TP works when the brain is concurrently faced with multimodality sensory inputs. Modality attention (MA) is a crucial cognitive function for dealing with the overwhelming information induced by multimodality sensory inputs. Therefore, it is necessary to investigate whether and how the MA influences the neural effects of the precise TP. This study designed a visual–auditory temporal discrimination task, in which the MA was allocated to visual or auditory modality, and the TP was manipulated into no timing prediction (NTP), matched timing prediction (MTP), and violated timing prediction (VTP) conditions. Behavioral and electroencephalogram (EEG) data were recorded from 27 subjects, event-related potentials (ERP), time–frequency distributions of inter-trial coherence (ITC), and event-related spectral perturbation (ERSP) were analyzed. In the visual modality, precise TP led to N1 amplitude and 200–400 ms theta ITC variations. Such variations only emerged when the MA was attended. In auditory modality, the MTP had the largest P2 amplitude and delta ITC than other TP conditions when the MA was attended, whereas the distinctions disappeared when the MA was unattended. The results suggest that the MA promoted the neural effects of the precise TP in early sensory processing, which provides more neural evidence for better understanding the interactions between the TP and MA. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A P300-based speller can be used to control a home automation system via brain activity. Evaluation of the visual stimuli used in a P300-based speller is a common topic in the field of brain–computer interfaces (BCIs). The aim of the present work is to compare, using the usability approach, two types of stimuli that have provided high performance in previous studies. Twelve participants controlled a BCI under two conditions, which varied in terms of the type of stimulus employed: a red famous face surrounded by a white rectangle (RFW) and a range of neutral pictures (NPs). The usability approach included variables related to effectiveness (accuracy and information transfer rate), efficiency (stress and fatigue), and satisfaction (pleasantness and System Usability Scale and Affect Grid questionnaires). The results indicated that there were no significant differences in effectiveness, but the system that used NPs was reported as significantly more pleasant. Hence, since satisfaction variables should also be considered in systems that potential users are likely to employ regularly, the use of different NPs may be a more suitable option than the use of a single RFW for the development of a home automation system based on a visual P300-based speller. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rapid serial visual presentation (RSVP) is currently one of the most suitable paradigms for use with a visual brain–computer interface based on event-related potentials (ERP-BCI) by patients with a lack of ocular motility. However, gaze-independent paradigms have not been studied as closely as gaze-dependent ones, and variables such as the sizes of the stimuli presented have not yet been explored under RSVP. Hence, the aim of the present work is to assess whether stimulus size has an impact on ERP-BCI performance under the RSVP paradigm. Twelve participants tested the ERP-BCI under RSVP using three different stimulus sizes: small (0.1 × 0.1 cm), medium (1.9 × 1.8 cm), and large (20.05 × 19.9 cm) at 60 cm. The results showed significant differences in accuracy between the conditions; the larger the stimulus, the better the accuracy obtained. It was also shown that these differences were not due to incorrect perception of the stimuli since there was no effect from the size in a perceptual discrimination task. The present work therefore shows that stimulus size has an impact on the performance of an ERP-BCI under RSVP. This finding should be considered by future ERP-BCI proposals aimed at users who need gaze-independent systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Short-term auditory habituation is typically reflected by decreased but recoverable amplitudes of the N1 component of event-related potentials to repeated stimuli. It remains less well understood whether and how N1 habituation is modulated by the human cognition. The current study aims to further test for the potential modulatory roles of phonological information carried by spoken word-forms. Two phonological variables, namely lexicality (real versus pseudoword-form) and usage frequency (high versus low frequency), are considered and combined factorially, yielding four types of monosyllabic Mandarin spoken word-forms. Each type consists of 10 items (i.e., word-forms). The stimuli were passively presented to native Mandarin speakers in trains of five (S1–S5), while their EEG was recorded. The peak amplitudes of N1 to the same type of speech stimuli were calculated for each position by averaging the trains extracted from the EEG recording. Then, the N1 habituation was quantified for the two electrodes of interest (C3 and C4) in each repetitive presentation position (S2–S5). The results showed that the N1 habituation in low-frequency pseudo word-forms was consistently greater than in low-frequency real word-forms and high-frequency pseudo word-forms, respectively, at the fourth presentation (S4). The results suggest the first evidence that different types of phonological information (i.e., lexicality and usage frequency) modulate N1 habituation, interactively. Sensory filtering is proposed as a candidate mechanism for mediating between the processing of phonological information and the short-term habituation of auditory N1. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Association between familial loading for alcohol use disorders (AUD) and event-related potentials (ERPs) suggests a genetic basis for these oscillations though much less is known about epigenetic pathways influenced by environmental variation. Early life adversity (ELA) influences negative outcomes much later in life. The stress-activated neuropeptide corticotropin-releasing hormone (CRH) contributes to the deleterious effects of ELA on brain structure and function in animals. Accordingly, we hypothesized that ELA would be related to cortical thickness and electrophysiological characteristics through an epigenetic effect on CRH receptor type-1 (CRHR1) methylation. A total of 217 adolescent and young adult participants from either multiplex alcohol dependence or control families were scanned using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) at 3T and cortical thickness was determined. Longitudinal follow-up across childhood, adolescence, and young adulthood provided developmental ERP data and measures of adversity. Blood samples for genetic and epigenetic analyses were obtained in childhood. Cortical thickness and visual ERP components were analyzed for their association and tested for familial risk group differences. Visual P300 amplitude at Pz and cortical thickness of the left lateral orbitofrontal region (LOFC), were significantly related to risk group status. LOFC cortical thickness showed a negative correlation with CRHR1 methylation status and with childhood total stress scores from the Life Stressors and Social Resources Inventory (LISRES). Stress scores were also significantly related to P300 amplitude recorded in childhood. The present results suggest that early life adversity reflected in greater total LISRES stress scores in childhood can impact the methylation of the CRHR1 gene with implications for brain development as seen in cortical thickness and electrophysiological signals emanating from particular brain regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Herein, we developed an auditory stimulus pattern for an event-related potential (ERP)-based brain–computer interface (BCI) system to improve control and communication in quadriplegia with visual impairment. Auditory stimulus paradigms for multicommand electroencephalogram (EEG)-based BCIs and audio stimulus patterns were examined. With the proposed auditory stimulation, using the selected Thai vowel, similar to the English vowel, and Thai numeral sounds, as simple target recognition, we explored the ERPs' response and classification efficiency from the suggested EEG channels. We also investigated the use of single and multi-loudspeakers for auditory stimuli. Four commands were created using the proposed paradigm. The experimental paradigm was designed to observe ERP responses and verify the proposed auditory stimulus pattern. The conventional classification method produced four commands using the proposed auditory stimulus pattern. The results established that the proposed auditory stimulation with 20 to 30 trials of stream stimuli could produce a prominent ERP response from Pz channels. The vowel stimuli could achieve higher accuracy than the proposed numeral stimuli for two auditory stimuli intervals (100 and 250 ms). Additionally, multi-loudspeaker patterns through vowel and numeral sound stimulation provided an accuracy greater than 85% of the average accuracy. Thus, the proposed auditory stimulation patterns can be implemented as a real-time BCI system to aid in the daily activities of quadratic patients with visual and tactile impairments. In future, practical use of the auditory ERP-based BCI system will be demonstrated and verified in an actual scenario. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Science is starting to unravel the neural basis of romantic love. The goal of this literature review was to identify and interpret the electrophysiological correlates of romantic love. Electroencephalography (EEG) and event-related potential (ERP) studies with a design that elicits romantic love feelings were included. The methods of previous EEG studies are too heterogeneous to draw conclusions. Multiple ERP studies, however, have shown that beloved stimuli elicit an enhanced late positive potential (LPP/P3/P300), which is not due to familiarity, positive valence, or objective beauty. This effect occurs in Western and Eastern cultures and for pictorial and verbal information, and results from bottom-up rather than top-down factors. Studies have also shown that beloved stimuli elicit an early posterior negativity (EPN), which also does not seem to be due to familiarity or positive valence. Data on earlier ERP components (P1, N1, P2, N170/VPP, N2) is scarce and mixed. Of course, the enhanced LPP and EPN are not specific to romantic love. Instead, they suggest that the beloved captures early attention, within 200–300 ms after stimulus onset that is relatively resource-independent, and subsequently receives sustained motivated attention. Future research would benefit from employing cognitive tasks and testing participants who are in love regardless of relationship status. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The self is one of the most important concepts in psychology, which is of great significance for human survival and development. As an important self-related stimulus, the subject's own name (SON) shows great advantages in cognitive and social processing and is widely used as an oddball stimulus in previous studies. However, it remained unknown whether the multiple repetition of stimulus would have similar influence on the neural response to SON and the other names under equal probability. In this study, adopting EEG and an equal–probability paradigm, we first detected the SON-related ERP components which could differentiate SON from other names, and then investigated how these components are influenced by repeated exposure of the stimulus. Our results showed that SON evoked an earlier SON-related negativity (SRN) at the fronto-central region and a late positive potential (LPP) at the centro-parietal region. More intriguingly, the earlier SRN demonstrated reduction after multiple repetitions, whereas LPP did not exhibit significant changes. In conclusion, these findings revealed that multiple repetitions of the stimulus might influence the various temporal stages in SON-related processing and highlighted the robustness of the late stage in this processing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In practical applications, such as patient brain signals monitoring, a non-invasive recording system with fewer channels for an easy setup and a wireless connection for remotely monitor physiological signals will be beneficial. In this paper, we investigate the feasibility of using such a system in a visual perception scenario. We investigate the complexity perception of color natural and synthetic fractal texture images, by studying the correlations between four types of data: image complexity that is expressed by computed color entropy and color fractal dimension, human subjective evaluation by scoring, and the measured brain EEG responses via Event-Related Potentials. We report on the considerable correlation experimentally observed between the recorded EEG signals and image complexity while considering three complexity levels, as well on the use of an EEG wireless system with few channels for practical applications, with the corresponding electrodes placement in accordance with the type of neural activity recorded. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Brain responses to discrete stimuli are modulated when multiple stimuli are presented in sequence. These alterations are especially pronounced when the time course of an evoked response overlaps with responses to subsequent stimuli, such as in a rapid serial visual presentation (RSVP) paradigm used to control a brain-computer interface (BCI). The present study explored whether the measurement or classification of select brain responses during RSVP would improve through application of an established technique for dealing with overlapping stimulus presentations, known as irregular or "jittered" stimulus onset interval (SOI). EEG data were collected from 24 healthy adult participants across multiple rounds of RSVP calibration and copy phrase tasks with varying degrees of SOI jitter. Analyses measured three separate brain signals sensitive to attention: N200, P300, and occipitoparietal alpha attenuation. Presentation jitter visibly reduced intrusion of the SSVEP, but in general, it did not positively or negatively affect attention effects, classification, or system performance. Though it remains unclear whether stimulus overlap is detrimental to BCI performance overall, the present study demonstrates that single-trial classification approaches may be resilient to rhythmic intrusions like SSVEP that appear in the averaged EEG., Competing Interests: Conflicts of Interest: The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

Proactive inhibition is divided into two components: action postponing (AP), which refers to slowing the onset of response, and action restraint (AR), which refers to preventing the response. To date, several studies have reported alterations in proactive inhibition and its associated neural processing among sensory modalities; however, this remains inconclusive owing to several methodological issues. This study aimed to clarify the differences in AP and AR and their neural processing among visual, auditory, and somatosensory modalities using an appropriate experimental paradigm that can assess AP and AR separately. The postponing time calculated by subtracting simple reaction time from Go signal reaction time was shorter in the visual modality than in the other modalities. This was explained by faster neural processing for conflict monitoring induced by anticipating the presence of the No-go signal, supported by the shorter latency of AP-related N2. Furthermore, the percentage of false alarms, which is the reaction to No-go signals, was lower in the visual modality than in the auditory modality. This was attributed to higher neural resources for conflict monitoring induced by the presence of No-go signals, supported by the larger amplitudes of AR-related N2. Our findings revealed the differences in AP and AR and their neural processing among sensory modalities.

People show a separation of intention and behavior in green consumption, and promoting actual green purchase behavior is more important than purchase intention. This study adopted a conflicting environmental decision paradigm to investigate behavioral and neural processes during actual green consumption decision-making involving different types of green products and message framing, according to construal level theory. Participants were instructed to make green consumption decisions involving green products with different psychological distances (self-interested green products vs. other-interested green products) under gain (e.g., buying green products brings positive results) or loss framing (e.g., not buying green products brings negative effects) while electroencephalograms were recorded. The behavioral results demonstrated that participants tended to purchase green products under loss framing more than under gain framing. The event-related potential results showed that under gain framing, decision-making for self-interested green products was associated with larger P3 than decision-making for other-interested green products. While under loss framing, decision-making for other-interested green products has a larger P260 than for self-interested green products. These findings suggest that under gain framing, self-interested green products elicit more cognitive resources than other-interested green products, while under loss framing, other-interested green products elicit stronger negative emotions than self-interested green products. The research has managerial implications for promoting consumers' actual purchase behavior.

Physiological studies have shown that self-body images receive unique recognition processing in a wide range of brain areas, from the frontal lobe to the parietal-occipital cortex. Event-related potential (ERP) studies have shown that the self-referential effect on the image of a hand increases P300 components, but such studies do not evaluate brain oscillatory activity. In this study, we aimed to discover the self-specific brain electrophysiological activity in relation to hand images. ERPs on the fronto-parietal midline were elicited by a three-stimulus visual oddball task using hand images: the self-hand, another hand (most similar to the self-hand), and another hand (similar to the self-hand). We analyzed ERP waveform and brain oscillatory activity by simple averaging and time-frequency analysis. The simple averaging analysis found no significant differences between the responses for the three stimulus tasks in all time windows. However, time-frequency analysis showed that self-hand stimuli elicited high gamma ERS in 650–900 ms at the Cz electrode compared to other hand stimuli. Our results show that brain activity specific to the self-referential process to the self-hand image was reflected in the long latency gamma band activity in the mid-central region. This high gamma-band activity at the Cz electrode may be similar to the activity of the mirror neuron system, which is involved in hand motion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Visual word recognition is a relatively effortless process, but recent research suggests the system involved is malleable, with evidence of increases in behavioural efficiency after prolonged lexical decision task (LDT) performance. However, the extent of neural changes has yet to be characterized in this context. The neural changes that occur could be related to a shift from initially effortful performance that is supported by control-related processing, to efficient task performance that is supported by domain-specific processing. To investigate this, we replicated the British Lexicon Project, and had participants complete 16 h of LDT over several days. We recorded electroencephalography (EEG) at three intervals to track neural change during LDT performance and assessed event-related potentials and brain signal complexity. We found that response times decreased during LDT performance, and there was evidence of neural change through N170, P200, N400, and late positive component (LPC) amplitudes across the EEG sessions, which suggested a shift from control-related to domain-specific processing. We also found widespread complexity decreases alongside localized increases, suggesting that processing became more efficient with specific increases in processing flexibility. Together, these findings suggest that neural processing becomes more efficient and optimized to support prolonged LDT performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Studies so far have analyzed the effect of distractor stimuli in different types of brain–computer interface (BCI). However, the effect of a background speech has not been studied using an auditory event-related potential (ERP-BCI), a convenient option when the visual path cannot be adopted by users. Thus, the aim of the present work is to examine the impact of a background speech on selection performance and user workload in auditory BCI systems. Eleven participants tested three conditions: (i) auditory BCI control condition, (ii) auditory BCI with a background speech to ignore (non-attentional condition), and (iii) auditory BCI while the user has to pay attention to the background speech (attentional condition). The results demonstrated that, despite no significant differences in performance, shared attention to auditory BCI and background speech required a higher cognitive workload. In addition, the P300 target stimuli in the non-attentional condition were significantly higher than those in the attentional condition for several channels. The non-attentional condition was the only condition that showed significant differences in the amplitude of the P300 between target and non-target stimuli. The present study indicates that background speech, especially when it is attended to, is an important interference that should be avoided while using an auditory BCI. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim was to investigate behavioral reactions and event-related potential (ERP) responses in healthy participants under conditions of personalized attribution of emotional appraisal vocabulary to one-self or to other people. One hundred and fifty emotionally neutral, positive and negative words describing people's traits were used. Subjects were asked to attribute each word to four types of people: one-self, loved, unpleasant and neutral person. The reaction time during adjectives attribution to one-self and a loved person was shorter than during adjectives attribution to neutral and unpleasant people. Self-related adjectives induced higher amplitudes of the N400 ERP peak in the medial cortical areas in comparison with adjectives related to other people. The amplitude of P300 and P600 depended on the emotional valence of assessments, but not on the personalized attribution. The interaction between the attribution effect and the effect of emotional valence of assessments was observed for the N400 peak in the left temporal area. The maximal amplitude of N400 was revealed under self-attributing of emotionally positive adjectives. Our results supported the hypothesis that the emotional valence of assessments and the processing of information about one-self or others were related to the brain processes that differ from each other in a cortical localization or time dynamics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study presents a new approach to exploring human inhibition in a realistic scenario. In previous inhibition studies, the stimulus design of go/no-go task generally used a simple symbol for the go and stop signals. We can understand the neural activity of inhibition through simple symbol scenario. In the real world, situations of human inhibition are more complex than performing an experiment in the laboratory scale. How to explore the neural activities of inhibition in a realistic environment is more complex. Consequently, we designed a battlefield scenario to investigate the neural activities of inhibition in a more realistic environmental setting. The battlefield scenario provides stronger emotion, motivation and real-world experiences for participants during inhibition. In the battlefield scenario, the signs of fixation, go and stop were replaced by images of a sniper scope, a target and a non-target. The battlefield scenario is a shooting game between the enemy and the soldiers. In battlefield scenario participants played the role of the soldiers for shooting target and to stop shooting when a non-target appeared. Electroencephalography (EEG) signals from twenty participants were acquired and analyzed using independent component analysis (ICA) and dipole source localization method. The results of event-related potential (ERP) showed a significant modulation of the peaks N1, N2 and P3 in the frontal and cingulate cortices under inhibitory control. The partially overlapping ERP N2 and P3 waves were associated with inhibition in the frontal cortex. The ERP N2, N1 and P3 waves in the cingulate cortex are related to sustained attention, motivation, emotion and inhibitory control. In addition, the event-related spectral perturbation (ERSP) results shows that the powers of the delta and theta bands increased significantly in the frontal and cingulate cortices under human inhibitory control. The EEG-ERP waves and power spectra in the frontal and cingulate cortices were found more increased than in the parietal, occipital, left and right motor cortices after successful stop. These findings provide new insights to understand the global neural activities changes during human inhibitory control with realistic environmental scenario. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the effect that selected auditory distractions have on the signal of a visual P300 Speller in terms of accuracy, amplitude, latency, user preference, signal morphology, and overall signal quality. In addition, it ensues the development of a hierarchical taxonomy aimed at categorizing distractions in the P300b domain and the effect thereof. This work is part of a larger electroencephalography based project and is based on the P300 speller brain–computer interface (oddball) paradigm and the xDAWN algorithm, with eight to ten healthy subjects, using a non-invasive brain–computer interface based on low-fidelity electroencephalographic (EEG) equipment. Our results suggest that the accuracy was best for the lab condition (LC) at 100%, followed by music at 90% (M90) at 98%, trailed by music at 30% (M30) and music at 60% (M60) equally at 96%, and shadowed by ambient noise (AN) at 92.5%, passive talking (PT) at 90%, and finally by active listening (AL) at 87.5%. The subjects' preference prodigiously shows that the preferred condition was LC as originally expected, followed by M90, M60, AN, M30, AL, and PT. Statistical analysis between all independent variables shows that we accept our null hypothesis for both the amplitude and latency. This work includes data and comparisons from our previous papers. These additional results should give some insight into the practicability of the aforementioned P300 speller methodology and equipment to be used for real-world applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This electrophysiological study investigated the role of the medial olivocochlear (MOC) efferents in listening in noise. Both ears of eleven normal-hearing adult participants were tested. The physiological tests consisted of transient-evoked otoacoustic emission (TEOAE) inhibition and the measurement of cortical event-related potentials (ERPs). The mismatch negativity (MMN) and P300 responses were obtained in passive and active listening tasks, respectively. Behavioral responses for the word recognition in noise test were also analyzed. Consistent with previous findings, the TEOAE data showed significant inhibition in the presence of contralateral acoustic stimulation. However, performance in the word recognition in noise test was comparable for the two conditions (i.e., without contralateral stimulation and with contralateral stimulation). Peak latencies and peak amplitudes of MMN and P300 did not show changes with contralateral stimulation. Behavioral performance was also maintained in the P300 task. Together, the results show that the peripheral auditory efferent effects captured via otoacoustic emission (OAE) inhibition might not necessarily be reflected in measures of central cortical processing and behavioral performance. As the MOC effects may not play a role in all listening situations in adults, the functional significance of the cochlear effects of the medial olivocochlear efferents and the optimal conditions conducive to corresponding effects in behavioral and cortical responses remain to be elucidated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

(1) Background: Prediction of treatment outcome has been one of the core objectives in clinical research of patients with major depressive disorder (MDD). This study explored the possibility of event-related potential (ERP) markers to predict antidepressant treatment outcomes among MDD patients; (2) Methods: Fifty-two patients with MDD were recruited and evaluated through Hamilton depression (HAM-D), Hamilton anxiety rating scale (HAM-A), and CORE. Patients underwent a battery of ERP measures including frontal alpha symmetry (FAA) in the low alpha band (8–10 Hz), mismatch negativity (MMN), and loudness-dependent auditory evoked potentials (LDAEP); (3) Results: During the eight weeks of study, 61% of patients achieved remission, and 77% showed successful treatment responsiveness. Patients with low FAA in F5/F6 demonstrated a significantly higher remission/response ratio and better treatment responsiveness (F (2.560, 117.755) = 3.84, p = 0.016) compared to patients with high FAA. In addition, greater FAA in F7/F8 EEG channels was significantly associated with greater melancholia scores (r = 0.34, p = 0.018). Other ERP markers lacked any significant effect; (4) Conclusions: Our results suggested low FAA (i.e., greater left frontal activity) could reflect a good treatment response in MDD patients. These findings support that FAA could be a promising index in understanding both MDD and melancholic subtype. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The performance of the event-related potential (ERP)-based brain–computer interface (BCI) declines when applying it into the real environment, which limits the generality of the BCI. The sound is a common noise in daily life, and whether it has influence on this decline is unknown. This study designs a visual-auditory BCI task that requires the subject to focus on the visual interface to output commands and simultaneously count number according to an auditory story. The story is played at three speeds to cause different workloads. Data collected under the same or different workloads are used to train and test classifiers. The results show that when the speed of playing the story increases, the amplitudes of P300 and N200 potentials decrease by 0.86 μV (p = 0.0239) and 0.69 μV (p = 0.0158) in occipital-parietal area, leading to a 5.95% decline (p = 0.0101) of accuracy and 9.53 bits/min decline (p = 0.0416) of information transfer rate. The classifier that is trained by the high workload data achieves higher accuracy than the one trained by the low workload if using the high workload data to test the performance. The result indicates that the sound could affect the visual ERP-BCI by increasing the workload. The large similarity of the training data and testing data is as important as the amplitudes of the ERP on obtaining high performance, which gives us an insight on how make to the ERP-BCI generalized. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A new SMART fabric concept is reported in which visual changes of the material are designed to influence different human emotions. This is achieved by developing a novel electrochromic composite yarn, knitted into pattern-changing fabrics, which has high response in temperature change and uniform contrast. The influence of these pattern-changing effects on the response of the human visual brain is investigated further by using event-related potential (ERP). Four SMART pattern-changing fabric pairs were used in this experiment. Each fabric presents two patterns interactively with different, but complementary or opposing, pattern attributes. 20 participants took part in the experiment, in which they were exposed to the patterns, while their visual brain activities were recorded. Comparisons of the three prominent ERP components; P1, N1, and P2 that correspond to the two patterns of each fabric have shown significant differences in the latency and amplitude of these components. These differences show that patterns and pattern-changing cause different visual impacts and that these changes influence our level of attention and processing effort. The study concludes that with the pattern changing ability of these thermochromic hybrid materials we can create designs with attributes that can directly manipulate user emotions, which we like to call 'psychotextiles'. Our study also poses much wider questions of our image processing process in relation to design and art.

Multisensory integration (MSI) is necessary for the efficient execution of many everyday tasks. Alterations in sensorimotor integration (SMI) have been observed in individuals with subclinical neck pain (SCNP). Altered audiovisual MSI has previously been demonstrated in this population using performance measures, such as reaction time. However, neurophysiological techniques have not been combined with performance measures in the SCNP population to determine differences in neural processing that may contribute to these behavioral characteristics. Electroencephalography (EEG) event-related potentials (ERPs) have been successfully used in recent MSI studies to show differences in neural processing between different clinical populations. This study combined behavioral and ERP measures to characterize MSI differences between healthy and SCNP groups. EEG was recorded as 24 participants performed 8 blocks of a simple reaction time (RT) MSI task, with each block consisting of 34 auditory (A), visual (V), and audiovisual (AV) trials. Participants responded to the stimuli by pressing a response key. Both groups responded fastest to the AV condition. The healthy group demonstrated significantly faster RTs for the AV and V conditions. There were significant group differences in neural activity from 100-140 ms post-stimulus onset, with the control group demonstrating greater MSI. Differences in brain activity and RT between individuals with SCNP and a control group indicate neurophysiological alterations in how individuals with SCNP process audiovisual stimuli. This suggests that SCNP alters MSI. This study presents novel EEG findings that demonstrate MSI differences in a group of individuals with SCNP.

A brain–computer interface (BCI) is a type of interface/communication system that can help users interact with their environments. Electroencephalography (EEG) has become the most common application of BCIs and provides a way for disabled individuals to communicate. While wet sensors are the most commonly used sensors for traditional EEG measurements, they require considerable preparation time, including the time needed to prepare the skin and to use the conductive gel. Additionally, the conductive gel dries over time, leading to degraded performance. Furthermore, requiring patients to wear wet sensors to record EEG signals is considered highly inconvenient. Here, we report a wireless 8-channel digital active-circuit EEG signal acquisition system that uses dry sensors. Active-circuit systems for EEG measurement allow people to engage in daily life while using these systems, and the advantages of these systems can be further improved by utilizing dry sensors. Moreover, the use of dry sensors can help both disabled and healthy people enjoy the convenience of BCIs in daily life. To verify the reliability of the proposed system, we designed three experiments in which we evaluated eye blinking and teeth gritting, measured alpha waves, and recorded event-related potentials (ERPs) to compare our developed system with a standard Neuroscan EEG system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]