Cortex; a journal devoted to the study of the nervous system and behavior
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Creativity is imperative to the progression of civilization and is central to cultural life. Many neuroimaging studies have investigated the patterns of functional activity in the brain during different creative tasks, and the structural and functional characteristics of the highly creative individuals. However, few studies have investigated resting-state functional connectivity (RSFC) in the brain related to individual differences in creativity, and it is still unclear whether the RSFC underlying creativity can be changed by training. ⋯ In addition, behavioral data showed that cognitive stimulation was successful in enhancing originality in a subset of the original participants (n = 34). Most interesting, we found that there was also a significantly increased RSFC between the mPFC and the mTG by analyzing the data of Rs-fMRI after creativity training. Taken together, these results suggest that increased RSFC between mPFC and mTG, which belong to the default mode network might be crucial to creativity, and that RSFC between the mPFC and mTG can be improved by means of cognitive stimulation (reflecting creativity training-induced changes in functional connectivity, especially in the lower creativity individuals who had lower scores of Torrance Tests of Creative Thinking).
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Randomized Controlled Trial
Transcranial direct current stimulation over multiple days improves learning and maintenance of a novel vocabulary.
Recently, growing interest emerged in the enhancement of human potential by means of non-invasive brain stimulation. In particular, anodal transcranial direct current stimulation (atDCS) has been shown to exert beneficial effects on motor and higher cognitive functions. However, the majority of transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) studies have assessed effects of single stimulation sessions that are mediated by transient neural modulation. Studies assessing the impact of multiple stimulation sessions on learning that may induce long-lasting behavioural and neural changes are scarce and have not yet been accomplished in the language domain in healthy individuals. ⋯ The present study provides direct evidence that atDCS administered during multiple learning sessions facilitates language learning and that effects are maintained over time. This study contributes important novel information about the extent of stimulation effects in the healthy brain, thereby highlighting the potential of atDCS to enhance language recovery after stroke.
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Case Reports
Sight and sound out of synch: fragmentation and renormalisation of audiovisual integration and subjective timing.
The sight and sound of a person speaking or a ball bouncing may seem simultaneous, but their corresponding neural signals are spread out over time as they arrive at different multisensory brain sites. How subjective timing relates to such neural timing remains a fundamental neuroscientific and philosophical puzzle. A dominant assumption is that temporal coherence is achieved by sensory resynchronisation or recalibration across asynchronous brain events. ⋯ Our findings reveal remarkable disunity of audiovisual timing within and between subjects. To explain this we propose that the timing of audiovisual signals within different brain mechanisms is perceived relative to the average timing across mechanisms. Such renormalisation fully explains the curious antagonistic relationship between disparate timing estimates in PH and healthy participants, and how they can still perceive the timing of external events correctly, on average.
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In patients with spatial neglect, body perception and representation are impaired - especially the projection of the anterior body midline in anterior space (the subjective "straight ahead"). However, data on more lateral body parts and the posterior body surface are scarce. We explored deviations of the perception of different body points located to the left or right of the midline and on the anterior and posterior body surfaces, and their lesion correlates in right hemisphere stroke patients. ⋯ These observations were compatible with a complex bias in body perception-representation extending to various lateral body points, with a left to right gradient. The right parietal cortex likely participates in processing such information.
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An attentional bias to threat has been causally related to anxiety. Recent research has linked nonconscious attentional bias to threat with variability in the integrity of the amygdala - anterior cingulate pathway, which sheds light on the neuroanatomical basis for a behavioral precursor to anxiety. However, the extent to which structural variability in amygdala - anterior cingulate integrity relates to the functional connectivity within this pathway and how such functional connectivity may relate to attention bias behavior, remain critical missing pieces of the puzzle. ⋯ We found that greater biases in attention to threat predicted greater levels of uncinate fasciculus integrity, greater positive amygdala - anterior cingulate functional connectivity, and greater amygdala coupling with a broader social perception network including the superior temporal sulcus, tempoparietal junction (TPJ), and somatosensory cortex. Additionally, greater levels of uncinate fasciculus integrity correlated with greater levels of amygdala - anterior cingulate intrinsic functional connectivity. Thus, high bias individuals displayed a heightened degree of amygdala - anterior cingulate connectivity during basal conditions, which we believe predisposes these individuals to focus their attention on signals of threat within their environment.