Rapid Mental Fatigue Amplifies Age-Related Attentional Deficits

2014 ◽  
Vol 28 (3) ◽  
pp. 215-224 ◽  
Author(s):  
Edmund Wascher ◽  
Stephan Getzmann
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Executive Control ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Mental Fatigue ◽  
Time On Task ◽  
Attentional Deficits ◽  
Performance Loss ◽  
Control Functions ◽  
Age Related ◽  
Related Potentials

Deficient information processing with increasing age has been assigned to reduced efficiency in frontal executive control functions. Dopamine has been assumed to play a central role for this decline. Dopamine, however, is also essential for the maintenance of motivation for a longer period of time and is therefore a core factor for mental fatigue. Combining these two findings, we tested to what degree older adults are more prone to performance loss due to increasing time on task than younger adults. Twelve younger and twelve older participants performed an inhibition of return task for 80 min. Performance declined in the older participants but not in the young. Event-related potentials (ERPs) of the EEG, however, showed distinct changes with time on task primarily for young participants. The dissociation between behavioral and ERP results indicates that changes in ERPs of the young participants could reflect adaptations to the task rather than fatigue. This is evident from very distinct changes of the posterior N1 component in this group. The failing (or rather unspecific) adaptation to the task in older adults might have been a consequence of lacking frontal executive control functions reflected in a massive reduction of the N2 component of the ERP, relative to the young participants.

scholarly journals Electrophysiological differences in older and younger adults’ anaphoric but not cataphoric pronoun processing in the absence of age-related behavioural slowdown

2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Seçkin Arslan ◽  
Katerina Palasis ◽  
Fanny Meunier
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Short Term Memory ◽  
Memory Span ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Brain Regions ◽  
Younger Adults ◽  
Behavioural Responses ◽  
Age Related ◽  
Related Potentials ◽  
Anterior Negativity

Abstract This study reports on an event-related potentials experiment to uncover whether per-millisecond electrophysiological brain activity and analogous behavioural responses are age-sensitive when comprehending anaphoric (referent-first) and cataphoric (pronoun-first) pronouns. Two groups of French speakers were recruited (young n = 18; aged 19–35 and older adults n = 15; aged 57–88) to read sentences where the anaphoric/cataphoric pronouns and their potential referents either matched or mismatched in gender. Our findings indicate that (1) the older adults were not less accurate or slower in their behavioural responses to the mismatches than the younger adults, (2) both anaphoric and cataphoric conditions evoked a central/parietally distributed P600 component with similar timing and amplitude in both the groups. Importantly, mean amplitudes of the P600 effect were modulated by verbal short-term memory span in the older adults but not in the younger adults, (3) nevertheless, the older but not the younger adults displayed an additional anterior negativity emerging on the frontal regions in response to the anaphoric mismatches. These results suggest that pronoun processing is resilient in healthy ageing individuals, but that functional recruitment of additional brain regions, evidenced with the anterior negativity, compensates for increased processing demands in the older adults’ anaphora processing.

scholarly journals Temporal Dynamics of Event-Related Potentials during Inhibitory Control Characterize Age-Related Neural Compensation

Symmetry ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (12) ◽  
pp. 2323
Author(s):  
Elizabeth R. Paitel ◽  
Kristy A. Nielson
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Young Adults ◽  
Inhibitory Control ◽  
Right Hemisphere ◽  
Temporal Dynamics ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Conflict Monitoring ◽  
Age Related ◽  
Related Potentials ◽  
Spatio Temporal

Aging is accompanied by frontal lobe and non-dominant hemisphere recruitment that supports executive functioning, such as inhibitory control, which is crucial to all cognitive functions. However, the spatio-temporal sequence of processing underlying successful inhibition and how it changes with age is understudied. Thus, we capitalized on the temporal precision of event-related potentials (ERPs) to assess the functional lateralization of N200 (conflict monitoring) and P300 (inhibitory performance evaluation) in young and healthy older adults during comparably performed successful stop-signal inhibition. We additionally used temporal principal components analysis (PCA) to further interrogate the continuous spatio-temporal dynamics underlying N200 and P300 activation for each group. Young adults demonstrated left hemisphere-dominant N200, while older adults demonstrated overall larger amplitudes and right hemisphere dominance. N200 activation was explained by a single PCA factor in both age groups, but with a more anterior scalp distribution in older adults. The P300 amplitudes were larger in the right hemisphere in young, but bilateral in old, with old larger than young in the left hemisphere. P300 was also explained by a single factor in young adults but by two factors in older adults, including distinct parieto-occipital and anterior activation. These findings highlight the differential functional asymmetries of conflict monitoring (N200) and inhibitory evaluation and adaptation (P300) processes and further illuminate unique age-related spatio-temporal recruitment patterns. Older adults demonstrated lateralized recruitment during conflict processing and bilateral recruitment during evaluation and adaptation, with anterior recruitment common to both processes. These fine-grained analyses are critically important for more precise understanding of age-related compensatory activation.

scholarly journals Temporal Dynamics of Event-Related Potentials During Inhibitory Control Characterize Age-Related Neural Compensation

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elizabeth R Paitel ◽  
Kristy A Nielson
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Left Hemisphere ◽  
Inhibitory Control ◽  
Response Inhibition ◽  
Temporal Dynamics ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Conflict Monitoring ◽  
Age Related ◽  
Related Potentials ◽  
Spatio Temporal

Aging is accompanied by frontal lobe and non-dominant hemisphere recruitment that supports executive functioning, such as inhibitory control, which is crucial to all cognitive functions. Yet, the spatio-temporal sequence of processing underlying successful inhibition and how it changes with age is understudied. Thus, we assessed N200 (conflict monitoring) and P300 (response inhibition, performance evaluation) event-related potentials (ERPs) in young and healthy older adults during comparably performed successful stop-signal inhibition. We additionally interrogated the continuous spatio-temporal dynamics of N200- and P300-related activation within each group. Young adults had left hemisphere dominant N200, while older adults had overall larger amplitudes and right hemisphere dominance. N200 activation was biphasic in both groups but differed in scalp topography. P300 also differed, with larger right amplitudes in young, but bilateral amplitudes in old, with old larger than young in the left hemisphere. P300 was characterized by an early parieto-occipital peak in both groups, followed by a parietal slow wave only in older adults. A temporally similar but topographically different final wave followed in both groups that showed anterior recruitment in older adults. These findings illuminate differential age-related spatio-temporal recruitment patterns for conflict monitoring and response inhibition that are critically important for understanding age-related compensatory activation.

scholarly journals Older Adults Automatically Detect Age of Older Adults’ Photographs: A Visual Mismatch Negativity Study

2021 ◽  
Vol 15 ◽  
Author(s):  
Petra Csizmadia ◽  
Bela Petro ◽  
Petia Kojouharova ◽  
Zsófia Anna Gaál ◽  
Katalin Scheiling ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Mismatch Negativity ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
The Elderly ◽  
Regular Sequence ◽  
Bias Effect ◽  
Visual Mismatch Negativity ◽  
Age Related ◽  
Related Potentials ◽  
And Gender

The human face is one of the most frequently used stimuli in vMMN (visual mismatch negativity) research. Previous studies showed that vMMN is sensitive to facial emotions and gender, but investigations of age-related vMMN differences are relatively rare. The aim of this study was to investigate whether the models’ age in photographs were automatically detected, even if the photographs were not parts of the ongoing task. Furthermore, we investigated age-related differences, and the possibility of different sensitivity to photographs of participants’ own versus different ages. We recorded event-related potentials (ERPs) to faces of young and old models in younger (N = 20; 18–30 years) and older groups (N = 20; 60–75 years). The faces appeared around the location of the field of a tracking task. In sequences the young or the old faces were either frequent (standards) or infrequent (deviants). According to the results, a regular sequence of models’ age is automatically registered, and faces violating the models’ age elicited the vMMN component. However, in this study vMMN emerged only in the older group to same-age deviants. This finding is explained by the less effective inhibition of irrelevant stimuli in the elderly, and corresponds to own-age bias effect of recognition studies.

scholarly journals Age-related Differences in Prestimulus Subsequent Memory Effects Assessed with Event-related Potentials

2018 ◽  
Vol 30 (6) ◽  
pp. 829-850 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joshua D. Koen ◽  
Erin D. Horne ◽  
Nedra Hauck ◽  
Michael D. Rugg
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Young Adults ◽  
Time Window ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Memory Effects ◽  
Late Time ◽  
Memory Encoding ◽  
Study Item ◽  
Age Related ◽  
Related Potentials

Prestimulus subsequent memory effects (preSMEs)—differences in neural activity elicited by a task cue at encoding that are predictive of later memory performance—are thought to reflect differential engagement of preparatory processes that benefit episodic memory encoding. We investigated age differences in preSMEs indexed by differences in ERP amplitude just before the onset of a study item. Young and older adults incidentally encoded words for a subsequent memory test. Each study word was preceded by a task cue that signaled a judgment to perform on the word. Words were presented for either a short (300 msec) or long (1000 msec) duration with the aim of placing differential benefits on engaging preparatory processes initiated by the task cue. ERPs associated with subsequent successful and unsuccessful recollection, operationalized here by source memory accuracy, were estimated time-locked to the onset of the task cue. In a late time window (1000–2000 msec after onset of the cue), young adults demonstrated frontally distributed preSMEs for both the short and long study durations, albeit with opposite polarities in the two conditions. This finding suggests that preSMEs in young adults are sensitive to perceived task demands. Although older adults showed no evidence of preSMEs in the same late time window, significant preSMEs were observed in an earlier time window (500–1000 msec) that was invariant with study duration. These results are broadly consistent with the proposal that older adults differ from their younger counterparts in how they engage preparatory processes during memory encoding.

scholarly journals Investigating Age-Related Neural Compensation During Emotion Perception Using Electroencephalography

2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 61
Author(s):  
Tao Yang ◽  
Caroline Di Bernardi Luft ◽  
Pei Sun ◽  
Joydeep Bhattacharya ◽  
Michael J. Banissy
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Emotion Processing ◽  
Emotion Perception ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Theoretical Models ◽  
Stimulus Onset ◽  
Age Related ◽  
Related Potentials ◽  
Neural Compensation ◽  
Age Related Changes

Previous research suggests declines in emotion perception in older as compared to younger adults, but the underlying neural mechanisms remain unclear. Here, we address this by investigating how “face-age” and “face emotion intensity” affect both younger and older participants’ behavioural and neural responses using event-related potentials (ERPs). Sixteen young and fifteen older adults viewed and judged the emotion type of facial images with old or young face-age and with high- or low- emotion intensities while EEG was recorded. The ERP results revealed that young and older participants exhibited significant ERP differences in two neural clusters: the left frontal and centromedial regions (100–200 ms stimulus onset) and frontal region (250–900 ms) when perceiving neutral faces. Older participants also exhibited significantly higher ERPs within these two neural clusters during anger and happiness emotion perceptual tasks. However, while this pattern of activity supported neutral emotion processing, it was not sufficient to support the effective processing of facial expressions of anger and happiness as older adults showed reductions in performance when perceiving these emotions. These age-related changes are consistent with theoretical models of age-related changes in neurocognitive abilities and may reflect a general age-related cognitive neural compensation in older adults, rather than a specific emotion-processing neural compensation.

scholarly journals Effect of Cognitive Control on Age-Related Positivity Effects in Attentional Processing – Evidence From an Event-Related Brain Potential Study

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 ◽  
Author(s):  
Haining Liu ◽  
Yanli Liu ◽  
Xianling Dong ◽  
Haihong Liu ◽  
Buxin Han
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Cognitive Control ◽  
Right Hemisphere ◽  
Brain Activity ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Opposite Pattern ◽  
Younger Adults ◽  
Attentional Processing ◽  
Age Related ◽  
Related Potentials

Studies investigating age-related positivity effects during facial emotion processing have yielded contradictory results. The present study aimed to elucidate the mechanisms of cognitive control during attentional processing of emotional faces among older adults. We used go/no-go detection tasks combined with event-related potentials and source localization to examine the effects of response inhibition on age-related positivity effects. Data were obtained from 23 older and 23 younger healthy participants. Behavioral results showed that the discriminability index (d') of older adults on fear trials was significantly greater than that of younger adults [t(44)=2.37, p=0.024, Cohen’s d=0.70], whereas an opposite pattern was found in happy trials [t(44)=2.56, p=0.014, Cohen’s d=0.75]. The electroencephalography results on the amplitude of the N170 at the left electrode positions showed that the fear-neutral face pairs were larger than the happy-neutral ones for the younger adults [t(22)=2.32, p=0.030, Cohen’s d=0.48]; the older group’s right hemisphere presented similar tendency, although the results were not statistically significant [t(22)=1.97, p=0.061, Cohen’s d=0.41]. Further, the brain activity of the two hemispheres in older adults showed asymmetrical decrement. Our study demonstrated that the age-related “positivity effect” was not observed owing to the depletion of available cognitive resources at the early attentional stage. Moreover, bilateral activation of the two hemispheres may be important signals of normal aging.

The P3 Parietal-To-Frontal Shift Relates to Age-Related Slowing in a Selective Attention Task

2017 ◽  
Vol 31 (2) ◽  
pp. 49-66 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eva-Maria Reuter ◽  
Claudia Voelcker-Rehage ◽  
Solveig Vieluf ◽  
Franca Parianen Lesemann ◽  
Ben Godde
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Selective Attention ◽  
Response Times ◽  
Flanker Task ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Compensatory Mechanism ◽  
Attention Task ◽  
Equal Distribution ◽  
Age Related ◽  
Related Potentials

Abstract. Older adults recruit relatively more frontal as compared to parietal resources in a variety of cognitive and perceptual tasks. It is not yet clear whether this parietal-to-frontal shift is a compensatory mechanism, or simply reflects a reduction in processing efficiency. In this study we aimed to investigate how the parietal-to-frontal shift with aging relates to selective attention. Fourteen young and 26 older healthy adults performed a color Flanker task under three conditions (incongruent, congruent, neutral) and event-related potentials (ERPs) were measured. The P3 was analyzed for the electrode positions Pz, Cz, and Fz as an indicator of the parietal-to-frontal shift. Further, behavioral performance and other ERP components (P1 and N1 at electrodes O1 and O2; N2 at electrodes Fz and Cz) were investigated. First young and older adults were compared. Older adults had longer response times, reduced accuracy, longer P3 latencies, and a more frontal distribution of P3 than young adults. These results confirm the parietal-to-frontal shift in the P3 with age for the selective attention task. Second, based on the differences between frontal and parietal P3 activity the group of older adults was subdivided into those showing a rather equal distribution of the P3 and older participants showing a strong frontal focus of the P3. Older adults with a more frontally distributed P3 had longer response times than participants with a more equally distributed P3. These results suggest that the frontally distributed P3 observed in older adults has no compensatory function in selective attention but rather indicates less efficient processing and slowing with age.

The Effects of 43 Hours of Sleep Deprivation on Executive Control Functions: Event-Related Potentials in a Visual Go/No Go Task

2010 ◽  
Vol 38 (1) ◽  
pp. 29-42 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jian-Lin Qi ◽  
Yong-Cong Shao ◽  
Danmin Miao ◽  
Ming Fan ◽  
Guo-Hua Bi ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Sleep Deprivation ◽  
Executive Control ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Control Group ◽  
Control Functions ◽  
Correct Reaction ◽  
Related Potentials ◽  
The Mean ◽  
Eeg Recordings ◽  
Electroencephalogram Eeg

The aim of this study was to investigate how 43 hours of total sleep deprivation (TSD) influences executive control functions. Forty participants were assigned to either a TSD or a control group (no sleep deprivation; NSD group) and both groups were tested at 2:00am on day 3 (after 43 hours of sleep deprivation for the TSD group). Electroencephalogram (EEG) recordings were taken using 32 electrodes while a Go/No go task was administered. The amplitude of the N2 was significantly larger on the No-go trials as compared to the Go trials. In the No-go trials, the amplitudes of the No go-N2 and the No go-P3 were smaller in the TSD group than in the control group in terms of prolonged latencies. The mean correct reaction time, number of misses, and the false-alarm rate were also significantly longer and increased in the NSD group. Results indicated that executive control functions were noticeable impaired after 43 hours of sleep deprivation.

Age-Related Effects on ERP and Oscillatory EEG-Dynamics in a 2-Back Task

2014 ◽  
Vol 28 (3) ◽  
pp. 162-177 ◽  
Author(s):  
Patrick D. Gajewski ◽  
Michael Falkenstein
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Working Memory ◽  
Temporal Dynamics ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Frequency Range ◽  
Younger Adults ◽  
Time Frequency ◽  
Age Related ◽  
Related Potentials ◽  
Back Task

It is well known that working memory is one of the most vulnerable cognitive functions in elderly. However, little is known about the neuronal underpinnings and temporal dynamics of working memory mechanisms in healthy aging which are necessary to understand the age-related changes. To this end, 36 young and 36 old healthy individuals performed a 2-back task and a 0-back control task, while the electroencephalogram (EEG) was recorded. Participants were instructed to press a response key whenever a target appeared and not to respond in case of nontargets. Expectedly, older participants showed considerably slower RTs and significantly higher rates of omitted targets and false alarms than young participants in the 2-back task, whereas no age-group difference in detection rate was found in the 0-back task. From the EEG event-related potentials as well as time-frequency plots were computed. The ERPs showed a general delay of the frontocentral N2, and an attenuation and delay of both the P3a and P3b in older versus younger adults. Importantly, the frontal P3a was reduced in older adults in the 2-back task. Time-frequency decomposition revealed consistently lower power in frontal theta (6 Hz) and parietal alpha (9–11 Hz) frequency range in older versus younger adults whereas no age-related differences were found in the delta frequency range. Task unspecific reduction of posterior alpha in elderly was paralleled by a reduction of the P3b. In contrast, the older adults had a strongly reduced frontal theta power in the 2-back task, which parallels the P3a reduction in the ERPs. The widespread reduction of alpha may indicate that older adults needed to recruit more attentional resources for successful task performance, whereas reduced frontal theta may indicate that older adults are less able to recruit frontal resources related to top-down control with increasing task demands. This suggests a less efficient fronto-parietal network synchronicity in older individuals that leads to deficits in identification and maintenance of task relevant stimuli.

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