Electrophysiological brain dynamics of visuospatial planning
Cognitive planning, which is the ability to develop a sequenced plan to achieve a goal, plays a crucial role in human goal-directed behavior (i.e. cognitive control). However, its neural correlates, particularly its electrophysiological dynamics, remain elusive at present. Behavioral paradigms of pl...
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| Tipo de recurso: | tesis doctoral |
| Estado: | Versión publicada |
| Fecha de publicación: | 2020 |
| País: | Chile |
| OAI Identifier: | oai:repositorio.anid.cl:10533/249754 |
| Acceso en línea: | https://hdl.handle.net/10533/249754 |
| Access Level: | acceso abierto |
| Palabra clave: | Ciencias Naturales Otras Ciencias Naturales |
| Sumario: | Cognitive planning, which is the ability to develop a sequenced plan to achieve a goal, plays a crucial role in human goal-directed behavior (i.e. cognitive control). However, its neural correlates, particularly its electrophysiological dynamics, remain elusive at present. Behavioral paradigms of planning are a current challenge in cognitive neuroscience. In this doctoral thesis, electroencephalographic (EEG) activity was recorded while twenty-seven healthy adult subjects performed a novel behavioral paradigm designed for this doctoral thesis (based on Porteus Maze and Zoo Map Task), that evaluates planning function in an ecological manner. The behavioral paradigm that we constructed was composed of a planning task and a control task. The planning task consisted of solving 36 mazes/trials which represented a zoo map. Each trial had four different periods: i) a planning period, where subjects were asked to plan a path to visit locations of four animals following a set of rules. After this, there was ii) a maintenance period. During this period, subjects had to store the planned path in their working memory. Then, during iii) the execution period, subjects drew the previous planned path. Finally, there was iv) a response period, where subjects reported the sequence of animals visited according to their planned path. The control task had the same structure, but the cognitive planning component was removed by modifying the task goal. The behavioral results showed that the planning task was more complex and cognitively demanding than the control condition suggesting that our experimental paradigm was optimal to evaluate the planning function. Interestingly, we found differences between easy and difficult trials at the behavioral level but no differences at the electrophysiological level. This contributed to the idea that the planning task assesses more intrinsic aspects of planning reflected in theta (4-8 Hz) oscillation changes than other general cognitive demands typically present in cognitive control tasks. EEG activity was analyzed at the time-frequency domain, by assesses induced oscillatory activity. Specifically, we hypothesized that cognitive planning will induce theta activity specifically in midfrontal electrode sites. Thus, our results showed, in agreement with our hypothesis, a progressive and sustained increase in theta band overtime during the planning period. Source analysis indicated that the origin of this induced theta activity was from specific regions within the prefrontal cortex. Specifically, in bilateral sources such as the frontopolar cortex, the anterior cingulate cortex, and the mid-Cingulate cortex. Furthermore, we found discernable associations between theta activity from regions within the prefrontal cortex and behavioral performance. These results suggest that theta activity from the left frontopolar cortex is associated with the efficiency and accuracy of elaborating and executing plans. Whereas theta activity from the right mid-Cingulate cortex and the left anterior cingulate cortex were related to mental elaboration of a plan. Finally, widespread theta phase connectivity increases between Fz and long-distant electrode sites were found during the planning condition. Hence, for the first time we characterized both spatial and temporal frontal-midline theta (FMθ) dynamics of cognitive planning as a marker of cognitive control, which may be coordinating information, such as visuospatial analysis and motor control preparation, through prefrontal cortex and disparate brain regions via theta phase connectivity during planning performance. The specific association between the left frontopolar cortex theta activity and planning performance may reflect the participation in elaborating a successfully self-generated plan. Furthermore, the associations between theta activity from the right mid-Cingulate cortex and the left anterior cingulate cortex with slower reaction times during the planning period may reflect attentional control engagement and conflict monitoring implementation. |
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