scholarly journals The encoding of stochastic regularities is facilitated by action-effect predictions

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Betina Korka ◽  
Erich Schröger ◽  
Andreas Widmann
Keyword(s):  
Coding Theory ◽  
Predictive Coding ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Random Order ◽  
Generative Models ◽  
Higher Order ◽  
Action Effect ◽  
Related Potentials ◽  
Sensory Prediction ◽  
Action Intention

AbstractOur brains continuously build and update predictive models of the world, sources of prediction being drawn for example from sensory regularities and/or our own actions. Yet, recent results in the auditory system indicate that stochastic regularities may not be easily encoded when a rare medium pitch deviant is presented between frequent high and low pitch standard sounds in random order, as reflected in the lack of sensory prediction error event-related potentials [i.e., mismatch negativity (MMN)]. We wanted to test the implication of the predictive coding theory that predictions based on higher-order generative models—here, based on action intention, are fed top-down in the hierarchy to sensory levels. Participants produced random sequences of high and low pitch sounds by button presses in two conditions: In a “specific” condition, one button produced high and the other low pitch sounds; in an “unspecific” condition, both buttons randomly produced high or low-pitch sounds. Rare medium pitch deviants elicited larger MMN and N2 responses in the “specific” compared to the “unspecific” condition, despite equal sound probabilities. These results thus demonstrate that action-effect predictions can boost stochastic regularity-based predictions and engage higher-order deviance detection processes, extending previous notions on the role of action predictions at sensory levels.

scholarly journals Somatosensory Deviance Detection ERPs and Their Relationship to Analogous Auditory ERPs and Interoceptive Accuracy

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elina S. Kangas ◽  
Elisa Vuoriainen ◽  
Xueqiao Li ◽  
Pessi Lyyra ◽  
Piia Astikainen
Keyword(s):  
Coding Theory ◽  
Predictive Coding ◽  
Sound Intensity ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Functional Relationships ◽  
Deviance Detection ◽  
Brain Responses ◽  
Intensity Changes ◽  
Related Potentials ◽  
Interoceptive Accuracy

Abstract. Automatic deviance detection has been widely explored in terms of mismatch responses (mismatch negativity or mismatch response) and P3a components of event-related potentials (ERPs) under a predictive coding framework; however, the somatosensory mismatch response has been investigated less often regarding the different types of changes than its auditory counterpart. It is not known whether the deviance detection responses from different modalities correlate, reflecting a general prediction error mechanism of the central nervous system. Furthermore, interoceptive functions have been associated with predictive coding theory, but whether interoceptive accuracy correlates with deviance detection brain responses has rarely been investigated. Here, we measured ERPs to changes in somatosensory stimuli’s location and intensity and in sound intensity in healthy adults ( n = 34). Interoceptive accuracy was measured with a heartbeat discrimination task, where participants indicated whether their heartbeats were simultaneous or non-simultaneous with sound stimuli. We found a mismatch response and a P3a response to somatosensory location and auditory intensity changes, but for somatosensory intensity changes, only a P3a response was found. Unexpectedly, there were neither correlations between the somatosensory location deviance and intensity deviance brain responses nor between auditory and somatosensory brain responses. In addition, the brain responses did not correlate with interoceptive accuracy. The results suggest that although deviance detection in the auditory and somatosensory modalities are likely based on similar neural mechanisms at a cellular level, their ERP indexes do not indicate a linear association in sensitivity for deviance detection between the modalities. Furthermore, although sensory deviance detection and interoceptive detection are both associated with predictive coding functions, under these experimental settings, functional relationships were not observed. These results should be taken into account in the future development of theories related to human sensory functions and in extensions of the predictive coding theory in particular.

scholarly journals Attention and prediction modulations in expected and unexpected visuospatial trajectories

PLoS ONE ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (10) ◽  
pp. e0242753
Author(s):  
Kristen S. Baker ◽  
Alan J. Pegna ◽  
Naohide Yamamoto ◽  
Patrick Johnston
Keyword(s):  
Visual Information ◽  
Prediction Error ◽  
Coding Theory ◽  
Predictive Coding ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Visual Display ◽  
Spatial Location ◽  
Prior Context ◽  
Related Potentials

Humans are constantly exposed to a rich tapestry of visual information in a potentially changing environment. To cope with the computational burden this engenders, our perceptual system must use prior context to simultaneously prioritise stimuli of importance and suppress irrelevant surroundings. This study investigated the influence of prediction and attention in visual perception by investigating event-related potentials (ERPs) often associated with these processes, N170 and N2pc for prediction and attention, respectively. A contextual trajectory paradigm was used which violated visual predictions and neglected to predetermine areas of spatial interest, to account for the potentially unpredictable nature of a real-life visual scene. Participants (N = 36) viewed a visual display of cued and non-cued shapes rotating in a five-step predictable trajectory, with the fifth and final position of either the cued or non-cued shape occurring in a predictable or unpredictable spatial location. To investigate the predictive coding theory of attention we used factors of attention and prediction, whereby attention was manipulated as either cued or non-cued conditions, and prediction manipulated in either predictable or unpredictable conditions. Results showed both enhanced N170 and N2pc amplitudes to unpredictable compared to predictable stimuli. Stimulus cueing status also increased N170 amplitude, but this did not interact with stimulus predictability. The N2pc amplitude was not affected by stimulus cueing status. In accordance with previous research these results suggest the N170 is in part a visual prediction error response with respect to higher-level visual processes, and furthermore the N2pc may index attention reorientation. The results demonstrate prior context influences the sensitivity of the N170 and N2pc electrophysiological responses. These findings add further support to the role of N170 as a prediction error signal and suggest that the N2pc may reflect attentional reorientation in response to unpredicted stimulus locations.

An ERP Study on Facial Expression of Emotion: Comparison of Linguistic and Visual Semantic Decoding

2005 ◽  
Vol 100 (1) ◽  
pp. 129-134 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michela Balconi
Keyword(s):  
Facial Expressions ◽  
Cognitive Processing ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Random Order ◽  
Normal Subjects ◽  
Emotional Content ◽  
Facial Stimuli ◽  
Facial Expression Of Emotion ◽  
Expression Of Emotion ◽  
Related Potentials

The present research compared the semantic information processing of linguistic stimuli with semantic elaboration of nonlinguistic facial stimuli. To explore brain potentials (ERPs, event-related potentials) related to decoding facial expressions and the effect of semantic valence of the stimulus, we analyzed data for 20 normal subjects ( M age = 23.6 yr., SD = 0.2). Faces with three basic emotional expressions (fear, happiness, and sadness from the 1976 Ekman and Friesen database), with three semantically anomalous expressions (with respect to their emotional content), and the neutral stimuli (face without an emotional content) were presented in a random order. Differences in peak amplitude of ERP were observed later for anomalous expressions compared with congruous expressions. In fact, the results demonstrated that the emotional anomalous faces elicited a higher negative peak at about 360 msec., distributed mainly over the posterior sites. The observed electrophysiological activity may represent specific cognitive processing underlying the comprehension of facial expressions in detection of semantic anomaly. The evidence is in favour of comparability of this negative deflection with the N400 ERP effect elicited by linguistic anomalies.

scholarly journals Two Types of Action Error: Electrophysiological Evidence for Separable Inhibitory and Sustained Attention Neural Mechanisms Producing Error on Go/No-go Tasks

2009 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 93-104 ◽  
Author(s):  
Redmond G. O'Connell ◽  
Paul M. Dockree ◽  
Mark A. Bellgrove ◽  
Alessandra Turin ◽  
Seamus Ward ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Sustained Attention ◽  
Response Inhibition ◽  
Response Competition ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Random Order ◽  
Goal Maintenance ◽  
Error Related Negativity ◽  
Electrophysiological Evidence ◽  
Related Potentials ◽  
Fixed Condition

Disentangling the component processes that contribute to human executive control is a key challenge for cognitive neuroscience. Here, we employ event-related potentials to provide electrophysiological evidence that action errors during a go/no-go task can result either from sustained attention failures or from failures of response inhibition, and that these two processes are temporally and physiologically dissociable, although the behavioral error—a nonintended response—is the same. Thirteen right-handed participants performed a version of a go/no-go task in which stimuli were presented in a fixed and predictable order, thus encouraging attentional drift, and a second version in which an identical set of stimuli was presented in a random order, thus placing greater emphasis on response inhibition. Electrocortical markers associated with goal maintenance (late positivity, alpha synchronization) distinguished correct and incorrect performance in the fixed condition, whereas errors in the random condition were linked to a diminished N2–P3 inhibitory complex. In addition, the amplitude of the error-related negativity did not differ between correct and incorrect responses in the fixed condition, consistent with the view that errors in this condition do not arise from a failure to resolve response competition. Our data provide an electrophysiological dissociation of sustained attention and response inhibition.

Intramodal and crossmodal refractory effects: Evidence from oscillatory brain activity

2012 ◽  
Vol 25 (0) ◽  
pp. 192
Author(s):  
Davide Bottari ◽  
Sophie Rohlf ◽  
Marlene Hense ◽  
Boukje Habets ◽  
Brigitte Roeder
Keyword(s):  
Brain Activity ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Random Order ◽  
Oddball Paradigm ◽  
Brain Response ◽  
Time Frequency ◽  
Tactile Stimuli ◽  
Related Potentials ◽  
Oscillatory Brain Activity ◽  
Auditory Cortices

Event-related potentials (ERP) to the second stimulus of a pair are known to be reduced in amplitude. The magnitude of this ‘refractoriness’ is modulated by both the interstimulus interval and the similarity between the two stimuli. Intramodal refractoriness is interpreted as an index of a temporary decrement in neural responsiveness. So, cross-modal refractoriness might be an indicator of shared neural generators between modalities. We analysed oscillatory neuronal activity while participants were engaged in an oddball paradigm with auditory (4000 Hz, 50 ms-long, 90 db, bilateral) and tactile stimuli (50 ms-long, 125 Hz-vibrations, index fingers) presented in a random order with an ISI of either 1000 or 2000 ms. Participants were required to detect rare tactile (middle fingers) and auditory deviants (600 Hz). A time–frequency analysis of the brain response to the second stimulus of each pair (T-T, A-A, T-A and A-T) contrasting Short and Long ISIs revealed a reduced refractory effect after Long ISI with respect to Short ISI, in all pairs (both intramodal and cross-modal). This emerged as a broadly distributed increase of evoked theta activity (3–7 Hz, 100–500 ms). Only in intramodal tactile pairs and cross-modal tactile-auditory pairs we also observed that Long ISI with respect to Short ISI determined a decrease of induced alpha (8–12 Hz, 200–700 ms), a typical sign of enhanced neural excitability and thus decreased refractoriness. These data suggest that somatosensory and auditory cortices display different neural markers of refractoriness and that the auditory cortex might have a stronger low level degree of influence on the tactile cortex than vice-versa.

Two-Component Processes in Switching Attention: A Study of Event-Related Potentials

2002 ◽  
Vol 94 (3_suppl) ◽  
pp. 1168-1176 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shulan Hsieh
Keyword(s):  
Switch Cost ◽  
Reaction Times ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Random Order ◽  
Behavioral Studies ◽  
Two Component ◽  
Related Potentials ◽  
Component Processes ◽  
Fixed Order ◽  
Switching Attention

When participants are asked either to repeat the task from the previous trial or switch to the other task, their reaction times are larger for switched than repeated tasks. This “switch cost” has been repeatedly demonstrated in behavioral studies. In this study, event-related potentials (ERPs) were recorded from 12 healthy college students to assess whether this switch cost reflects component processes of preparation and interference. Analyses of ERPs showed that following the cue, there was greater positivity for a switched relative to a repeated trial when the tasks occurred in a fixed-order rather than in a random-order condition. Following the onset of the stimulus-pair, there was greater negativity for switched relative to repeated trials when the task stimulus consisted of both letters and digits but not when it consisted of either a letter or a digit paired with a neutral character. The data provide neurophysiological evidence for the two component processes.

scholarly journals Attention is more than prediction precision

2013 ◽  
Vol 36 (3) ◽  
pp. 206-208 ◽  
Author(s):  
Howard Bowman ◽  
Marco Filetti ◽  
Brad Wyble ◽  
Christian Olivers
Keyword(s):  
Prediction Error ◽  
Predictive Coding ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Evoked Responses ◽  
Target Article ◽  
Related Potentials

AbstractA cornerstone of the target article is that, in a predictive coding framework, attention can be modelled by weighting prediction error with a measure of precision. We argue that this is not a complete explanation, especially in the light of ERP (event-related potentials) data showing large evoked responses for frequently presented target stimuli, which thus are predicted.

scholarly journals Towards encoding shape features with visual event-related potential based brain–computer interface for generative design

2019 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 88-102
Author(s):  
Pierre Cutellic
Keyword(s):  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Generative Models ◽  
Event Related Potential ◽  
Cognitive Responses ◽  
Shape Features ◽  
Generative Design ◽  
Linear Classifiers ◽  
Machine Learning Model ◽  
Computational Implementation ◽  
Related Potentials

This article will focus on abstracting and generalising a well-studied paradigm in visual, event-related potential based brain–computer interfaces, for the spelling of characters forming words, into the visually encoded discrimination of shape features forming design aggregates. After identifying typical technologies in neuroscience and neuropsychology of high interest for integrating fast cognitive responses into generative design and proposing the machine learning model of an ensemble of linear classifiers in order to tackle the challenging features that electroencephalography data carry, it will present experiments in encoding shape features for generative models by a mechanism of visual context updating and the computational implementation of vision as inverse graphics, to suggest that discriminative neural phenomena of event-related potentials such as P300 may be used in a visual articulation strategy for modelling in generative design.

scholarly journals Detecting (un)seen change: The neural underpinnings of (un)conscious prediction errors

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elise G. Rowe ◽  
Naotsugu Tsuchiya ◽  
Marta I. Garrido
Keyword(s):  
Bayesian Model Averaging ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Generative Models ◽  
Oddball Paradigm ◽  
Prediction Errors ◽  
Motion Direction ◽  
Low Coherence ◽  
Repetition Suppression ◽  
Related Potentials ◽  
The Brain

ABSTRACTDetecting changes in the environment is fundamental for our survival. According to predictive coding theory, detecting these irregularities relies both on incoming sensory information and our top-down prior expectations (or internal generative models) about the world. Prediction errors (PEs), detectable in event-related potentials (ERPs), occur when there is a mismatch between the sensory input and our internal model (i.e., a surprise event). Many changes occurring in our environment are irrelevant for survival and may remain unseen. Such changes, even if subtle, can nevertheless be detected by the brain without emerging into consciousness. What remains unclear is how these changes are processed in the brain at the network level. Here, we used a visual oddball paradigm, in which participants engaged in a central letter task during electroencephalographic (EEG) recordings while presented with task-irrelevant high- or low-coherence background, random-dot motion. Critically, once in a while, the direction of the dots changed. After the EEG session, we confirmed that changes in motion direction at high- and low-coherence were visible and invisible, respectively, using psychophysical measurements. ERP analyses revealed that changes in motion direction elicited PE regardless of the visibility, but with distinct spatiotemporal patterns. To understand these responses, we applied Dynamic Causal Modelling (DCM) to the EEG data. Bayesian Model Averaging showed visible PE relied on a release from adaptation (repetition suppression) within bilateral MT+, whereas invisible PE relied on adaptation at bilateral V1 (and left MT+). Furthermore, while feedforward upregulation was present for invisible PE, the visible change PE also included downregulation of feedback between right MT+ to V1. Our findings reveal a complex interplay of modulation in the generative network models underlying visible and invisible motion changes.

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