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Brain imaging performed in natural settings is known as mobile brain and body imaging (MoBI). One of the features which distinguishes MoBI and laboratory-based experiments is the body posture. Previous studies pointed to mechanical, autonomic, cortical and cognitive differences between upright stance and sitting or reclining. The purpose of this study was to analyse effects of posture on eye-movement related potentials (EMRP) recorded during free viewing of human faces. A 64-channel wireless EEG was recorded from 14 participants in either standing or reclining postures while they freely viewed pictures of emotional faces displaying fear, anger, sadness, and a neutral emotional state. Eye tracking data was used to insert triggers corresponding to the instant at which the gaze first landed on a face. Spatial filtering of the EEG data was performed using a group independent component analysis (ICA). Grand average EMRPs displayed the post-saccadic lambda component and the face-sensitive N170/vertex positive potential (VPP) complex. The lambda component but not the N170 component was stronger during reclining than upright posture. Emotional expression of faces showed no effects on EMRP components or subjective ratings. Results suggest that posture primarily affects early components of EMRPs recorded using wireless EEG recordings during free viewing of faces. Thus, findings from evoked potential data obtained in seated individuals, e.g., in laboratory experiments, should be interpreted with caution in MoBI experiments with posture affecting primarily the early latency component.

IntroductionSocial adaptation is a multifaceted process that encompasses cognitive, social, and affective factors. Previous research often focused on isolated variables, overlooking their interactions, especially in challenging environments. Our study addresses this by investigating how cognitive (working memory, verbal intelligence, self-regulation), social (affective empathy, family networks, loneliness), and psychological (locus of control, self-esteem, perceived stress) factors interact to influence social adaptation.MethodsWe analyzed data from 254 adults (55% female) aged 18 to 46 in economically vulnerable households in Santiago, Chile. We used Latent profile analysis (LPA) and machine learning to uncover distinct patters of socioadaptive features and identify the most discriminating features.ResultsLPA showed two distinct psychosocial adaptation profiles: one characterized by effective psychosocial adaptation and another by poor psychosocial adaptation. The adaptive profile featured individuals with strong emotional, cognitive, and behavioral self-regulation, an internal locus of control, high self-esteem, lower stress levels, reduced affective empathy, robust family support, and decreased loneliness. Conversely, the poorly adapted profile exhibited the opposite traits. Machine learning pinpointed six key differentiating factors in various adaptation pathways within the same vulnerable context: high self-esteem, cognitive and behavioral self-regulation, low stress levels, higher education, and increased social support.DiscussionThis research carries significant policy implications, highlighting the need to reinforce protective factors and psychological resources, such as self-esteem, self-regulation, and education, to foster effective adaptation in adversity. Additionally, we identified critical risk factors impacting social adaptation in vulnerable populations, advancing our understanding of this intricate phenomenon.

Empathy is a complex and multifaceted phenomenon that plays a crucial role in human social interactions. Recent developments in social neuroscience have provided valuable insights into the neural underpinnings and bodily mechanisms underlying empathy. This methodology often prioritizes precision, replicability, internal validity, and confound control. However, fully understanding the complexity of empathy seems unattainable by solely relying on artificial and controlled laboratory settings, while overlooking a comprehensive view of empathy through an ecological experimental approach. In this article, we propose articulating an integrative theoretical and methodological framework based on the 5E approach (the “E”s stand for embodied, embedded, enacted, emotional, and extended perspectives of empathy), highlighting the relevance of studying empathy as an active interaction between embodied agents, embedded in a shared real-world environment. In addition, we illustrate how a novel multimodal approach including mobile brain and body imaging (MoBi) combined with phenomenological methods, and the implementation of interactive paradigms in a natural context, are adequate procedures to study empathy from the 5E approach. In doing so, we present the Empirical 5E approach (E5E) as an integrative scientific framework to bridge brain/body and phenomenological attributes in an interbody interactive setting. Progressing toward an E5E approach can be crucial to understanding empathy in accordance with the complexity of how it is experienced in the real world.

Values are attributed to goods during free viewing of objects which entails multi- and trans-saccadic cognitive processes. Using electroencephalographic eye-fixation related potentials, the present study investigated how neural signals related to value-guided choice evolved over time when viewing household and office products during an auction task. Participants completed a Becker-DeGroot-Marschak auction task whereby half of the stimuli were presented in either a free or forced bid protocol to obtain willingness-to-pay. Stimuli were assigned to three value categories of low, medium and high value based on subjective willingness-to-pay. Eye fixations were organised into five 800 ms time-bins spanning the objects total viewing time. Independent component analysis was applied to eye-fixation related potentials. One independent component (IC) was found to represent fixations for high value products with increased activation over the left parietal region of the scalp. An IC with a spatial maximum over a fronto-central region of the scalp coded the intermediate values. Finally, one IC displaying activity that extends over the right frontal scalp region responded to intermediate- and low-value items. Each of these components responded early on during viewing an object and remained active over the entire viewing period, both during free and forced bid trials. Results suggest that the subjective value of goods are encoded using sets of brain activation patterns which are tuned to respond uniquely to either low, medium, or high values. Data indicates that the right frontal region of the brain responds to low and the left frontal region to high values. Values of goods are determined at an early point in the decision making process and carried for the duration of the decision period via trans-saccadic processes.

Economic decision making refers to the process of individuals translating their preference into subjective value (SV). Little is known about the dynamics of the neural processes that underpin this form of value-based decision making and no studies have investigated these processes outside of controlled laboratory settings. The current study investigated the spatio-temporal dynamics that accompany economic valuation of products using mobile electroencephalography (EEG) and eye tracking techniques. Participants viewed and rated images of household products in a gallery setting while EEG and eye tracking data were collected wirelessly. A Becker-DeGroot-Marschak (BDM) auction task was subsequently used to quantify the individual’s willingness to pay (WTP) for each product. WTP was used to classify products into low, low medium, high medium and high economic value conditions. Eye movement related potentials (EMRP) were examined, and independent component analysis (ICA) was used to separate sources of activity from grand averaged EEG data. Four independent components (ICs) of EMRPs were modulated by WTP (i.e., SV) in the latency range of 150–250 ms. Of the four value-sensitive ICs, one IC displayed enhanced amplitude for all value conditions excluding low value, and another IC presented enhanced amplitude for low value products only. The remaining two value-sensitive ICs resolved inter-mediate levels of SV. Our study quantified, for the first time, the neural processes involved in economic value based decisions in a natural setting. Results suggest that multiple spatio-temporal brain activation patterns mediate the attention and aversion of products which could reflect an early valuation system. The EMRP parietal P200 component could reflect an attention allocation mechanism that separates the lowest-value products (IC7) from products of all other value (IC4), suggesting that low-value items are categorized early on as being aversive. While none of the ICs showed linear amplitude changes that parallel SV’s of products, results suggest that a combination of multiple components may sub-serve a fine-grained resolution of the SV of products.

The detection of a human face in a visual field and correct reading of emotional expression of faces are important elements in everyday social interactions, decision making and emotional responses. Although brain correlates of face processing have been established in previous fMRI and electroencephalography (EEG)/MEG studies, little is known about how the brain representation of faces and emotional expressions of faces in freely moving humans. The present study aimed to detect brain electrical potentials that occur during the viewing of human faces in natural settings. 64-channel wireless EEG and eye-tracking data were recorded in 19 participants while they moved in a mock art gallery and stopped at times to evaluate pictures hung on the walls. Positive, negative and neutral valence pictures of objects and human faces were displayed. The time instants in which pictures first occurred in the visual field were identified in eye-tracking data and used to reconstruct the triggers in continuous EEG data after synchronizing the time axes of the EEG and eye-tracking device. EEG data showed a clear face-related event-related potential (ERP) in the latency interval ranging from 165 to 210 ms (N170); this component was not seen whilst participants were viewing non-living objects. The face ERP component was stronger during viewing disgusted compared to neutral faces. Source dipole analysis revealed an equivalent current dipole in the right fusiform gyrus (BA37) accounting for N170 potential. Our study demonstrates for the first time the possibility of recording brain responses to human faces and emotional expressions in natural settings. This finding opens new possibilities for clinical, developmental, social, forensic, or marketing research in which information about face processing is of importance.

This study investigates two types of factors potentially affecting the level of complexity of processing subject–verb agreement: (i) distance between the subject and the critical verb (0, 1 or 2 constituents) and (ii) type of intervening constituent between the subject and the verb (adverb versus an NP within a PP). NPs, but not adverbs, include additional number features that potentially increase complexity of processing the agreement relationship between the number features of the subject NP and the verb. Event-related potentials (ERPs) were measured to investigate the neural correlates of agreement processing. Eighteen native Spanish speaking participants read grammatical sentences as well as ungrammatical sentences violating subject–verb agreement. The ungrammatical sentences elicited posterior negativities in the 350–500 ms time window. No effects of distance or type of constituents were found in this time window. A typical P600 effect was also observed in response to the agreement violations. The linear distance between the subject and the verb influenced the P600 effect; the sentences containing two constituents elicited more positive going waveforms compared to sentences without intervening constituents. The type of constituent did not play a role. The results fit psycholinguistic accounts assuming that integration of additional linguistic elements makes it more complex to process the subject–verb agreement relationship at the verb, regardless of the presence of additional number features. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introducción: el consumo de alcohol se reconoce como causa importante de accidentes de tránsito por el efecto depresor sobre el sistema nervioso central. Aunque las drogas recreacionales o ilegales tienen una acción similar es poco lo que se conoce sobre su relación con la accidentalidad vial. Objetivo: conocer la situación actual en Colombia y el mundo sobre los efectos del alcohol y las sustancias psicoactivas ilegales en el sistema nervioso central como posibles causas de accidentes de tránsito. Métodos: revisión de la literatura en bases electrónicas utilizando los términos DeCS y MeSH: street drugs, designed drugs, ethanol, cocaine, cannabinoides, amphetamines, injuries, accident traffic y automobile driving. Resultados: algunos estudios en especial en Estados Unidos, se reporta una relación estrecha entre el consumo de sustancias psicoactivas y la accidentalidad vial, con cifras cercanas a las del alcohol. En México también se ha demostrado esta relación. En Colombia la mayoría de publicaciones sobre factores de accidentalidad vial no diferencian el consumo de alcohol de las sustancias psicoactivas, lo cual refleja la falta de programas de promoción y prevención sobre el riesgo de conducir bajo la acción de estas sustancias. Los exámenes para determinar su presencia no se ordenan en forma rutinaria y por los datos existentes no reflejan los costos reales derivados de la atención a víctimas de accidentes de tránsito causados por conducir bajo sus efectos. Conclusiones: la situación actual sobre la accidentalidad vial muestra un preocupante aumento de la mortalidad, morbi­ lidad y discapacidad en países en vías de desarrollo como el nuestro. Se analizaron los efectos del alcohol, cocaína, canabinoides y metanfetaminas sobre el sistema nervioso central que disminuyen las habilidades del individuo para la conducción.