scholarly journals How Social Power Affects the Processing of Angry Expressions: Evidence From Behavioral and Electrophysiological Data

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 ◽  
Author(s):  
Entao Zhang ◽  
Xueling Ma ◽  
Ruiwen Tao ◽  
Tao Suo ◽  
Huang Gu ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Low Power ◽  
High Power ◽  
Late Stage ◽  
Social Power ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Oddball Paradigm ◽  
Neural Responses ◽  
Target Power ◽  
Related Potentials ◽  
Electroencephalogram Eeg

With the help of event-related potentials (ERPs), the present study used an oddball paradigm to investigate how both individual and target power modulate neural responses to angry expressions. Specifically, participants were assigned into a high-power or low-power condition. Then, they were asked to detect a deviant angry expression from a high-power or low-power target among a series of neutral expressions, while behavioral responses and electroencephalogram (EEG) were recorded. The behavioral results showed that high-power individuals responded faster to detect angry expressions than low-power individuals. The ERP analysis showed that high-power individuals showed larger P3 amplitudes in response to angry expressions than low-power individuals did. Target power increased the amplitudes of the P1, VPP, N3, and P3 in response to angry expressions did, but decreased the amplitudes of the N1 and N170 in response to angry expressions. The present study extended previous studies by showing that having more power could enhance individuals’ neural responses to angry expressions in the late-stage processes, and individuals could show stronger neural responses to angry expressions from high-power persons in both the early‐ and late-stage processes.

scholarly journals Predictive Processing in Poetic Language: Event-Related Potentials Data on Rhythmic Omissions in Metered Speech

2022 ◽  
Vol 12 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karen Henrich ◽  
Mathias Scharinger
Keyword(s):  
Language Processing ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Initial Position ◽  
Predictive Processing ◽  
Oddball Paradigm ◽  
Poetic Language ◽  
Brain Response ◽  
Related Potentials ◽  
Role Concerns ◽  
Electroencephalogram Eeg

Predictions during language comprehension are currently discussed from many points of view. One area where predictive processing may play a particular role concerns poetic language that is regularized by meter and rhyme, thus allowing strong predictions regarding the timing and stress of individual syllables. While there is growing evidence that these prosodic regularities influence language processing, less is known about the potential influence of prosodic preferences (binary, strong-weak patterns) on neurophysiological processes. To this end, the present electroencephalogram (EEG) study examined whether the predictability of strong and weak syllables within metered speech would differ as a function of meter (trochee vs. iamb). Strong, i.e., accented positions within a foot should be more predictable than weak, i.e., unaccented positions. Our focus was on disyllabic pseudowords that solely differed between trochaic and iambic structure, with trochees providing the preferred foot in German. Methodologically, we focused on the omission Mismatch Negativity (oMMN) that is elicited when an anticipated auditory stimulus is omitted. The resulting electrophysiological brain response is particularly interesting because its elicitation does not depend on a physical stimulus. Omissions in deviant position of a passive oddball paradigm occurred at either first- or second-syllable position of the aforementioned pseudowords, resulting in a 2-by-2 design with the factors foot type and omission position. Analyses focused on the mean oMMN amplitude and latency differences across the four conditions. The result pattern was characterized by an interaction of the effects of foot type and omission position for both amplitudes and latencies. In first position, omissions resulted in larger and earlier oMMNs for trochees than for iambs. In second position, omissions resulted in larger oMMNs for iambs than for trochees, but the oMMN latency did not differ. The results suggest that omissions, particularly in initial position, are modulated by a trochaic preference in German. The preferred strong-weak pattern may have strengthened the prosodic prediction, especially for matching, trochaic stimuli, such that the violation of this prediction led to an earlier and stronger prediction error. Altogether, predictive processing seems to play a particular role in metered speech, especially if the meter is based on the preferred foot type.

scholarly journals Perception of Prosodic Modulations of Linguistic and Paralinguistic Origin: Evidence From Early Auditory Event-Related Potentials

2021 ◽  
Vol 15 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hatice Zora ◽  
Valéria Csépe
Keyword(s):  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Pitch Accent ◽  
Oddball Paradigm ◽  
Neural Responses ◽  
Affective Prosody ◽  
Auditory Oddball ◽  
Prosodic Cues ◽  
Paralinguistic Information ◽  
Related Potentials ◽  
Motivational Salience

How listeners handle prosodic cues of linguistic and paralinguistic origin is a central question for spoken communication. In the present EEG study, we addressed this question by examining neural responses to variations in pitch accent (linguistic) and affective (paralinguistic) prosody in Swedish words, using a passive auditory oddball paradigm. The results indicated that changes in pitch accent and affective prosody elicited mismatch negativity (MMN) responses at around 200 ms, confirming the brain’s pre-attentive response to any prosodic modulation. The MMN amplitude was, however, statistically larger to the deviation in affective prosody in comparison to the deviation in pitch accent and affective prosody combined, which is in line with previous research indicating not only a larger MMN response to affective prosody in comparison to neutral prosody but also a smaller MMN response to multidimensional deviants than unidimensional ones. The results, further, showed a significant P3a response to the affective prosody change in comparison to the pitch accent change at around 300 ms, in accordance with previous findings showing an enhanced positive response to emotional stimuli. The present findings provide evidence for distinct neural processing of different prosodic cues, and statistically confirm the intrinsic perceptual and motivational salience of paralinguistic information in spoken communication.

EEG Measurement of Emotion Processing in Children with Daytime Urinary Incontinence

2018 ◽  
Vol 46 (4) ◽  
pp. 336-341
Author(s):  
Justine Niemczyk ◽  
Monika Equit ◽  
Katja Rieck ◽  
Mathias Rubly ◽  
Catharina Wagner ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Urinary Incontinence ◽  
Patient Group ◽  
Imaging Techniques ◽  
Emotion Processing ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Oddball Paradigm ◽  
Control Group ◽  
Central Processing ◽  
Daytime Urinary Incontinence ◽  
Related Potentials

Abstract. Objective: Daytime urinary incontinence (DUI) is common in childhood. The aim of the study was to neurophysiologically analyse the central emotion processing in children with DUI. Method: In 20 children with DUI (mean age 8.1 years, 55 % male) and 20 controls (mean age 9.1 years, 75 % male) visual event-related potentials (ERPs) were recorded after presenting emotionally valent (80 neutral, 40 positive, and 40 negative) pictures from the International Affective Picture System (IAPS) as an oddball-paradigm. All children received a full organic and psychiatric assessment. Results: Children with DUI did not differ significantly from controls regarding responses to emotional pictures in the frontal, central, and parietal regions and in the time intervals 250–450 ms, 450–650 ms, and 650–850 ms after stimulus onset. The patient group had more psychological symptoms and psychiatric comorbidities than the control group. Conclusions: EEG responses to emotional stimuli are not altered in children with DUI. Central emotion processing does not play a major role in DUI. Further research, including a larger sample size, a more homogeneous patient group (regarding subtype of DUI) or brain imaging techniques, could reveal more about the central processing in DUI.

Age does not necessarily influence latency of event-related potentials

2014 ◽  
Vol 33 (10) ◽  
pp. 723-727
Author(s):  
M. Westermann ◽  
I. W. Husstedt ◽  
A. Okegwo ◽  
S. Evers
Keyword(s):  
Normal Values ◽  
Rank Correlation ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Intrinsic Property ◽  
Total Sample ◽  
Oddball Paradigm ◽  
Age Dependent ◽  
Related Potentials ◽  
The Mean ◽  
P3 Component

SummaryEvent-related potentials (ERP) are regarded as age dependent. However, it is not known whether this is an intrinsic property of ERP or an extrinsic factor. We designed a setting in which ERP were evoked using a modified oddball paradigm with highly differentiable and detectable target and non-target stimuli. A total of 98 probands were enrolled in this study. We evaluated the latency and amplitude of the P3 component of visually evoked ERP. The mean P3 latency was 294 ± 28 ms and was not related to age (r = –0.089; p = 0.382; Spearman-rank-correlation). The P3 amplitude was related to age in the total sample (r = –0.323; p = 0.001; Spearmanrank-correlation) but not in the probands under the age of 60 years. There were no significant differences regarding sex. Our findings suggest that ERP are not age dependent if highly differentiable and detectable stimuli are used. This should be considered when normal values of ERP are created for clinical use.

scholarly journals Reduced Visual Magnocellular Event-Related Potentials in Developmental Dyslexia

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 48
Author(s):  
John Stein
Keyword(s):  
Steady State ◽  
Developmental Dyslexia ◽  
Reading Ability ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Black And White ◽  
Reverse Pattern ◽  
Related Potentials ◽  
The Right ◽  
Visual Hemifields ◽  
Electroencephalogram Eeg

(1) Background—the magnocellular hypothesis proposes that impaired development of the visual timing systems in the brain that are mediated by magnocellular (M-) neurons is a major cause of dyslexia. Their function can now be assessed quite easily by analysing averaged visually evoked event-related potentials (VERPs) in the electroencephalogram (EEG). Such analysis might provide a useful, objective biomarker for diagnosing developmental dyslexia. (2) Methods—in adult dyslexics and normally reading controls, we recorded steady state VERPs, and their frequency content was computed using the fast Fourier transform. The visual stimulus was a black and white checker board whose checks reversed contrast every 100 ms. M- cells respond to this stimulus mainly at 10 Hz, whereas parvocells (P-) do so at 5 Hz. Left and right visual hemifields were stimulated separately in some subjects to see if there were latency differences between the M- inputs to the right vs. left hemispheres, and these were compared with the subjects’ handedness. (3) Results—Controls demonstrated a larger 10 Hz than 5 Hz fundamental peak in the spectra, whereas the dyslexics showed the reverse pattern. The ratio of subjects’ 10/5 Hz amplitudes predicted their reading ability. The latency of the 10 Hz peak was shorter during left than during right hemifield stimulation, and shorter in controls than in dyslexics. The latter correlated weakly with their handedness. (4) Conclusion—Steady state visual ERPs may conveniently be used to identify developmental dyslexia. However, due to the limited numbers of subjects in each sub-study, these results need confirmation.

scholarly journals Frequency Sensitivity of Neural Responses to English Verb Argument Structure Violations

2018 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jona Sassenhagen ◽  
Ryan Blything ◽  
Elena V. M. Lieven ◽  
Ben Ambridge
Keyword(s):  
Statistical Learning ◽  
High Frequency ◽  
Argument Structure ◽  
Low Frequency ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Neural Responses ◽  
Online Processing ◽  
Verb Argument Structure ◽  
Related Potentials ◽  
Intransitive Verbs

How are verb-argument structure preferences acquired? Children typically receive very little negative evidence, raising the question of how they come to understand the restrictions on grammatical constructions. Statistical learning theories propose stochastic patterns in the input contain sufficient clues. For example, if a verb is very common, but never observed in transitive constructions, this would indicate that transitive usage of that verb is illegal. Ambridge et al. (2008) have shown that in offline grammaticality judgements of intransitive verbs used in transitive constructions, low-frequency verbs elicit higher acceptability ratings than high-frequency verbs, as predicted if relative frequency is a cue during statistical learning. Here, we investigate if the same pattern also emerges in on-line processing of English sentences. EEG was recorded while healthy adults listened to sentences featuring transitive uses of semantically matched verb pairs of differing frequencies. We replicate the finding of higher acceptabilities of transitive uses of low- vs. high-frequency intransitive verbs. Event-Related Potentials indicate a similar result: early electrophysiological signals distinguish between misuse of high- vs low-frequency verbs. This indicates online processing shows a similar sensitivity to frequency as off-line judgements, consistent with a parser that reflects an original acquisition of grammatical constructions via statistical cues. However, the nature of the observed neural responses was not of the expected, or an easily interpretable, form, motivating further work into neural correlates of online processing of syntactic constructions.

Implicit need for affiliation and processing of emotional images: Event-related potential correlates

2018 ◽  
Vol 46 (2) ◽  
pp. 273-280
Author(s):  
Jianfeng Wang ◽  
Yan Wu ◽  
Lushi Jing
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Processes ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Event Related Potential ◽  
Oddball Paradigm ◽  
Emotional Information ◽  
Need For Affiliation ◽  
Additional Information ◽  
Negative Images ◽  
Related Potentials ◽  
Emotional Information Processing

Implicit motives play an important role in the regulation of many basic cognitive processes, particularly in the stage of attention. We conducted a study with a sample of 58 college students to examine selective attention to emotional stimuli as a function of individual differences in the implicit need for affiliation (nAff). In an affective oddball paradigm, event-related potentials were recorded while participants viewed positive, neutral, and negative images of people. Results showed that individuals high in nAff elicited larger late positive potential amplitudes to negative images than those low in nAff did. These findings replicate and extend the results of a previous study focused on these relationships and provide additional information on the neural correlates of affiliation-related emotional information processing.

Saliency of Vowel Features in Neural Responses of Cochlear Implant Users

2018 ◽  
Vol 49 (6) ◽  
pp. 388-397
Author(s):  
François Prévost ◽  
Alexandre Lehmann
Keyword(s):  
Speech Recognition ◽  
Cochlear Implant ◽  
Fundamental Frequency ◽  
Mismatch Negativity ◽  
Free Field ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Oddball Paradigm ◽  
Aural Rehabilitation ◽  
Spectral Components ◽  
Related Potentials

Cochlear implants restore hearing in deaf individuals, but speech perception remains challenging. Poor discrimination of spectral components is thought to account for limitations of speech recognition in cochlear implant users. We investigated how combined variations of spectral components along two orthogonal dimensions can maximize neural discrimination between two vowels, as measured by mismatch negativity. Adult cochlear implant users and matched normal-hearing listeners underwent electroencephalographic event-related potentials recordings in an optimum-1 oddball paradigm. A standard /a/ vowel was delivered in an acoustic free field along with stimuli having a deviant fundamental frequency (+3 and +6 semitones), a deviant first formant making it a /i/ vowel or combined deviant fundamental frequency and first formant (+3 and +6 semitones /i/ vowels). Speech recognition was assessed with a word repetition task. An analysis of variance between both amplitude and latency of mismatch negativity elicited by each deviant vowel was performed. The strength of correlations between these parameters of mismatch negativity and speech recognition as well as participants’ age was assessed. Amplitude of mismatch negativity was weaker in cochlear implant users but was maximized by variations of vowels’ first formant. Latency of mismatch negativity was later in cochlear implant users and was particularly extended by variations of the fundamental frequency. Speech recognition correlated with parameters of mismatch negativity elicited by the specific variation of the first formant. This nonlinear effect of acoustic parameters on neural discrimination of vowels has implications for implant processor programming and aural rehabilitation.

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