Noninvasive Brain Stimulation Techniques Can Modulate Cognitive Processing

Recent methods that allow a noninvasive modulation of brain activity are able to modulate human cognitive behavior. Among these methods are transcranial electric stimulation and transcranial magnetic stimulation that both come in multiple variants. A property of both types of brain stimulation is that they modulate brain activity and in turn modulate cognitive behavior. Here, we describe the methods with their assumed neural mechanisms for readers from the economic and social sciences and little prior knowledge of these techniques. Our emphasis is on available protocols and experimental parameters to choose from when designing a study. We also review a selection of recent studies that have successfully applied them in the respective field. We provide short pointers to limitations that need to be considered and refer to the relevant papers where appropriate.

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Endogenous and exogenous electric fields as modifiers of brain activity: rational design of noninvasive brain stimulation with transcranial alternating current stimulation

Dialogues in Clinical Neuroscience ◽

10.31887/dcns.2014.16.1/ffroehlich ◽

2014 ◽

Vol 16 (1) ◽

pp. 93-102 ◽

Cited By ~ 15

Keyword(s):

Electric Fields ◽

Brain Stimulation ◽

Rational Design ◽

Brain Activity ◽

Field Potential ◽

Alternating Current ◽

Noninvasive Brain Stimulation ◽

Starting Point ◽

Recent Developments ◽

Transcranial Alternating Current Stimulation

Synchronized neuronal activity in the cortex generates weak electric fields that are routinely measured in humans and animal models by electroencephalography and local field potential recordings. Traditionally, these endogenous electric fields have been considered to be an epiphenomenon of brain activity. Recent work has demonstrated that active cortical networks are surprisingly susceptible to weak perturbations of the membrane voltage of a large number of neurons by electric fields. Simultaneously, noninvasive brain stimulation with weak, exogenous electric fields (transcranial current stimulation, TCS) has undergone a renaissance due to the broad scope of its possible applications in modulating brain activity for cognitive enhancement and treatment of brain disorders. This review aims to interface the recent developments in the study of both endogenous and exogenous electric fields, with a particular focus on rhythmic stimulation for the modulation of cortical oscillations. The main goal is to provide a starting point for the use of rational design for the development of novel mechanism-based TCS therapeutics based on transcranial alternating current stimulation, for the treatment of psychiatric illnesses.

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Inferring Causality from Noninvasive Brain Stimulation in Cognitive Neuroscience

Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience ◽

10.1162/jocn_a_01591 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 33 (2) ◽

pp. 195-225 ◽

Cited By ~ 5

Author(s):

Til Ole Bergmann ◽

Gesa Hartwigsen

Keyword(s):

Brain Stimulation ◽

Cognitive Neuroscience ◽

Brain Activity ◽

Sensory Stimulation ◽

Causal Chain ◽

Behavioral Measure ◽

Noninvasive Brain Stimulation ◽

Confounding Variables ◽

Remote Sites ◽

Stimulation Experiments

Noninvasive brain stimulation (NIBS) techniques, such as transcranial magnetic stimulation or transcranial direct and alternating current stimulation, are advocated as measures to enable causal inference in cognitive neuroscience experiments. Transcending the limitations of purely correlative neuroimaging measures and experimental sensory stimulation, they allow to experimentally manipulate brain activity and study its consequences for perception, cognition, and eventually, behavior. Although this is true in principle, particular caution is advised when interpreting brain stimulation experiments in a causal manner. Research hypotheses are often oversimplified, disregarding the underlying (implicitly assumed) complex chain of causation, namely, that the stimulation technique has to generate an electric field in the brain tissue, which then evokes or modulates neuronal activity both locally in the target region and in connected remote sites of the network, which in consequence affects the cognitive function of interest and eventually results in a change of the behavioral measure. Importantly, every link in this causal chain of effects can be confounded by several factors that have to be experimentally eliminated or controlled to attribute the observed results to their assumed cause. This is complicated by the fact that many of the mediating and confounding variables are not directly observable and dose–response relationships are often nonlinear. We will walk the reader through the chain of causation for a generic cognitive neuroscience NIBS study, discuss possible confounds, and advise appropriate control conditions. If crucial assumptions are explicitly tested (where possible) and confounds are experimentally well controlled, NIBS can indeed reveal cause–effect relationships in cognitive neuroscience studies.

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Skipping Breakfast Affects the Early Steps of Cognitive Processing

Journal of Psychophysiology ◽

10.1027/0269-8803/a000214 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 33 (2) ◽

pp. 109-118

Author(s):

Andrés Antonio González-Garrido ◽

Jacobo José Brofman-Epelbaum ◽

Fabiola Reveca Gómez-Velázquez ◽

Sebastián Agustín Balart-Sánchez ◽

Julieta Ramos-Loyo

Keyword(s):

Working Memory ◽

Cognitive Processing ◽

Task Difficulty ◽

Brain Activity ◽

Reaction Times ◽

Brain Potentials ◽

Brain Functioning ◽

Attentional Processes ◽

Electrical Brain Activity ◽

Skipping Breakfast

Abstract. It has been generally accepted that skipping breakfast adversely affects cognition, mainly disturbing the attentional processes. However, the effects of short-term fasting upon brain functioning are still unclear. We aimed to evaluate the effect of skipping breakfast on cognitive processing by studying the electrical brain activity of young healthy individuals while performing several working memory tasks. Accordingly, the behavioral results and event-related brain potentials (ERPs) of 20 healthy university students (10 males) were obtained and compared through analysis of variances (ANOVAs), during the performance of three n-back working memory (WM) tasks in two morning sessions on both normal (after breakfast) and 12-hour fasting conditions. Significantly fewer correct responses were achieved during fasting, mainly affecting the higher WM load task. In addition, there were prolonged reaction times with increased task difficulty, regardless of breakfast intake. ERP showed a significant voltage decrement for N200 and P300 during fasting, while the amplitude of P200 notably increased. The results suggest skipping breakfast disturbs earlier cognitive processing steps, particularly attention allocation, early decoding in working memory, and stimulus evaluation, and this effect increases with task difficulty.

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Faculty Opinions recommendation of Boosting Learning Efficacy with Noninvasive Brain Stimulation in Intact and Brain-Damaged Humans.

Faculty Opinions – Post-Publication Peer Review of the Biomedical Literature ◽

10.3410/f.735831507.793569039 ◽

2019 ◽

Author(s):

Radek Ptak

Keyword(s):

Brain Stimulation ◽

Noninvasive Brain Stimulation ◽

Learning Efficacy

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Applying a Sensing-Enabled System for Ensuring Safe Anterior Cingulate Deep Brain Stimulation for Pain

Brain Sciences ◽

10.3390/brainsci9070150 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 9 (7) ◽

pp. 150 ◽

Cited By ~ 5

Author(s):

Yongzhi Huang ◽

Binith Cheeran ◽

Alexander L. Green ◽

Timothy J. Denison ◽

Tipu Z. Aziz

Keyword(s):

Deep Brain Stimulation ◽

Pain Relief ◽

Brain Stimulation ◽

Brain Activity ◽

Anterior Cingulate ◽

Chronic Therapy ◽

Provide Pain Relief ◽

Surgical Options ◽

Effective Pain Relief ◽

Deep Brain

Deep brain stimulation (DBS) of the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) was offered to chronic pain patients who had exhausted medical and surgical options. However, several patients developed recurrent seizures. This work was conducted to assess the effect of ACC stimulation on the brain activity and to guide safe DBS programming. A sensing-enabled neurostimulator (Activa PC + S) allowing wireless recording through the stimulating electrodes was chronically implanted in three patients. Stimulation patterns with different amplitude levels and variable ramping rates were tested to investigate whether these patterns could provide pain relief without triggering after-discharges (ADs) within local field potentials (LFPs) recorded in the ACC. In the absence of ramping, AD activity was detected following stimulation at amplitude levels below those used in chronic therapy. Adjustment of stimulus cycling patterns, by slowly ramping on/off (8-s ramp duration), was able to prevent ADs at higher amplitude levels while maintaining effective pain relief. The absence of AD activity confirmed from the implant was correlated with the absence of clinical seizures. We propose that AD activity in the ACC could be a biomarker for the likelihood of seizures in these patients, and the application of sensing-enabled techniques has the potential to advance safer brain stimulation therapies, especially in novel targets.

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Noninvasive brain stimulation combined with exercise in chronic pain: a systematic review and meta-analysis

Expert Review of Neurotherapeutics ◽

10.1080/14737175.2020.1738927 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 20 (4) ◽

pp. 401-412

Author(s):

Alejandra Cardenas-Rojas ◽

Kevin Pacheco-Barrios ◽

Stefano Giannoni-Luza ◽

Oscar Rivera-Torrejon ◽

Felipe Fregni

Keyword(s):

Systematic Review ◽

Chronic Pain ◽

Brain Stimulation ◽

Meta Analysis ◽

Noninvasive Brain Stimulation

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Noninvasive brain stimulation for patients with a disorder of consciousness: a systematic review and meta-analysis

Reviews in the Neurosciences ◽

10.1515/revneuro-2020-0033 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 31 (8) ◽

pp. 905-914 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Yali Feng ◽

Jiaqi Zhang ◽

Yi Zhou ◽

Zhongfei Bai ◽

Ying Yin

Keyword(s):

Brain Stimulation ◽

Meta Analysis ◽

Minimally Conscious State ◽

Conscious State ◽

Primary Outcome Measure ◽

Noninvasive Brain Stimulation ◽

Disorder Of Consciousness ◽

Left Dlpfc ◽

Dorsolateral Prefrontal ◽

Minimally Conscious

AbstractNoninvasive brain stimulation (NIBS) techniques have been used to facilitate the recovery from prolonged unconsciousness as a result of brain injury. The aim of this study is to systematically assess the effects of NIBS in patients with a disorder of consciousness (DOC). We searched four databases for any randomized controlled trials on the effect of NIBS in patients with a DOC, which used the JFK Coma Recovery Scale-Revised (CRS-R) as the primary outcome measure. A random-effects meta-analysis was conducted to pool effect sizes. Fourteen studies with 273 participants were included in this review, of which 12 studies with sufficient data were included in the meta-analysis. Our meta-analysis showed a significant effect on increasing CRS-R scores in favor of real stimulation as compared to sham (Hedges’ g = 0.522; 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.318–0.726; P < 0.0001, I2 = 0.00%). Subgroup analysis demonstrated that only anodal transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) of the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) significantly enhances the CRS-R scores in patients with a DOC, as compared to sham (Hedges’ g = 0.703; 95% CI, 0.419–0.986; P < 0.001), and this effect was predominant in patients in a minimally conscious state (MCS) (Hedges’ g = 0.815; 95% CI, 0.429–1.200; P < 0.001). Anodal tDCS of the left DLPFC appears to be an effective approach for patients with MCS.

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