scholarly journals Time-oriented attention improves accuracy in a paced finger tapping task

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Leonardo Versaci ◽  
Rodrigo Laje

Finger tapping is a task widely used in a variety of experimental paradigms, in particular to understand sensorimotor synchronization and time processing in the range of hundreds of milliseconds (millisecond timing). Normally, subjects don’t receive any instruction about what to attend to and the results are seldom interpreted taking into account the possible effects of attention. In this work we show that attention can be oriented to the purely temporal aspects of a paced finger tapping task and that it affects performance. Specifically, time-oriented attention improves the accuracy in paced finger tapping and it also increases the resynchronization efficiency after a period perturbation. We use two markers of the attention level: auditory ERPs and subjective report of the mental workload. In addition, we propose a novel algorithm to separate the auditory, stimulus-related components from the somatosensory, response-related ones, which are naturally overlapped in the recorded EEG.

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yijing Zhang ◽  
Jinfei Ma ◽  
Chi Zhang ◽  
Ruosong Chang

Abstract With the continuous improvement of automated vehicles, researchers have found that automated driving is more likely to cause insufficient mental workload for the driver, which induces passive fatigue and endangers traffic safety. To explore the impact of automation and scenario complexity on the passive fatigue of the driver, we developed a three-factor, 2 (automated driving, manual driving) × 2 (monotonic condition, engaging condition) × 6 (measurement stage: 1–6) mixed experiment. We collected electroencephalography (EEG), detection-response task (DRT) performance, and the subjective report scores of 48 drivers. We found that in automated driving under monotonic conditions, the topographic map’s activation range of the drivers brain was the smallest in the six stages, and the mental workload of this group continued to maintain the lowest state at each stage; however, the subjectively reported fatigue level was significantly increased; thus, the driver experienced passive fatigue. After simulating a low-load scenario for 40 min, the power of the alpha of the driver’s EEG indicators increased significantly, the accuracy of the detection reaction task decreased, and the reaction time became slower. The EEG sample’s entropy value of the driver’s passive fatigue was 0.243, and the judgement accuracy rate was 0.71. We proved that in automated driving under monotonic conditions, the driver is more prone to passive fatigue owing to insufficient mental workload.


Author(s):  
Muhammad Farhan ◽  
Muhammad Salar Haider ◽  
N. Z. Jhanjhi ◽  
Rana Muhammad Amir Latif ◽  
Muhammad Yasir Bilal

ICT tools and machine learning tools are used to analyze the visual attention of the student. The student's attention score is calculated for the analysis of the visual attention of the student. For this purpose, the authors have developed a software package (i.e., Visual Attention Tool [VAT]) based on the ICT that extracts the frames from a video stream that is taken through the webcam attached to the student's laptop. Each image is converted into a grayscale image, enhanced by image processing, then face detection is performed by following eye detection. This real-time processing of video produces a dataset by tracking the faces and eyes. It measures the attention level of the student with the timestamp. A manual observer also calculates the student's attention score focusing face and eye contact and produces a dataset manually. Then a comparative analysis of both datasets is performed in statistical and machine learning tools.


1989 ◽  
Vol 32 (3) ◽  
pp. 698-702 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel Harris ◽  
Donald Fucci ◽  
Linda Petrosino

The present experiment was a preliminary attempt to use the psychophysical scaling methods of magnitude estimation and cross-modal matching to investigate suprathreshold judgments of lingual vibrotactile and auditory sensation magnitudes for 20 normal young adult subjects. A 250-Hz lingual vibrotactile stimulus and a 1000-Hz binaural auditory stimulus were employed. To obtain judgments for nonoral vibrotactile sensory magnitudes, the thenar eminence of the hand was also employed as a test site for 5 additional subjects. Eight stimulus intensities were presented during all experimental tasks. The results showed that the slopes of the log-log vibrotactile magnitude estimation functions decreased at higher stimulus intensity levels for both test sites. Auditory magnitude estimation functions were relatively constant throughout the stimulus range. Cross-modal matching functions for the two stimuli generally agreed with functions predicted from the magnitude estimation data, except when subjects adjusted vibration on the tongue to match auditory stimulus intensities. The results suggested that the methods of magnitude estimation and cross-modal matching may be useful for studying sensory processing in the speech production system. However, systematic investigation of response biases associated with vibrotactile-auditory psychophysical scaling tasks appears to be a prerequisite.


GeroPsych ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
pp. 41-52
Author(s):  
Matthew C. Costello ◽  
Shane J. Sizemore ◽  
Kimberly E. O’Brien ◽  
Lydia K. Manning

Abstract. This study explores the relative value of both subjectively reported cognitive speed and gait speed in association with objectively derived cognitive speed. It also explores how these factors are affected by psychological and physical well-being. A group of 90 cognitively healthy older adults ( M = 73.38, SD = 8.06 years, range = 60–89 years) were tested in a three-task cognitive battery to determine objective cognitive speed as well as measures of gait speed, well-being, and subjective cognitive speed. Analyses indicated that gait speed was associated with objective cognitive speed to a greater degree than was subjective report, the latter being more closely related to well-being than to objective cognitive speed. These results were largely invariant across the 30-year age range of our older adult sample.


2003 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 61-68 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michal Kuniecki ◽  
Robert Barry ◽  
Jan Kaiser

Abstract The effect of stimulus valence was examined in the evoked cardiac response (ECR) elicited by the exposition of neutral and negative slides as well as by an innocuous auditory stimulus presented on the affective foregrounds generated by the slides. The exposition of the aversive slide produced prolonged cardiac deceleration in comparison with the neutral slide. Similar prolonged deceleration accompanied exposition of the neutral auditory stimulus on the negative visual foreground in comparison with the neutral foreground. We interpret these results as an autonomic correlate of extended stimulus processing associated with the affective stimulus. The initial deceleration response, covering two or three slower heart beats, may be prolonged for several seconds before HR reaches the baseline level again. In such a case the evoked cardiac deceleration can be functionally divided into two parts: the reflexive bradycardia (ECR1) elicited by neutral stimuli and a late decelerative component (LDC). We can speculate that the latter is associated with an additional voluntary continuation of processing of the stimulus. This must involve some cognitive aspect different from the mental task performance which leads to the accelerative ECR2, and we suggest that processing of a stimulus with negative valence is involved in generating the LDC.


2009 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shaun S. Stearns ◽  
Daniel Maitland ◽  
Marietta Wojtecka ◽  
Nicole Kosner

Author(s):  
Randall L. Harris ◽  
John R. Tole ◽  
Arye R. Ephrath ◽  
A. Thomas Stephens

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