Abstract
A number of studies have focused on brain dynamics underlying mind wandering (MW) states in healthy people. However, there is limited understanding of how the oscillatory dynamics accompanying MW states and task-focused states are characterized in clinical populations. In this study, we explored EEG local synchrony of MW associated with schizophrenia, under the premise that changes in attention that arise during MW are associated with a different pattern of brain activity. To this end, we measured the power of EEG oscillations in different frequency bands, recorded while participants watched short video clips. In the group of participants diagnosed with schizophrenia, the power in MW states was significantly lower than during task-focused states, mainly in the frontal and posterior regions. However, in the group of healthy controls, the differences in power between the task-focused and MW states occurred exclusively in the posterior region. Furthermore, the power of the frequency bands during MW and during episodes of task-focused attention correlated with cognitive variables such as processing speed and working memory. These findings on dynamic changes of local synchronization in different frequency bands and areas of the cortex can improve our understanding of mental disorders, such as schizophrenia.
Highlights
Brain Sci. 2021, 11, 910. https://In recent years, there has been a growing interest in the study of mind wandering (MW) within the field of cognitive and clinical neuroscience
The approach we presented measured the oscillatory power in different frequency bands evoked by a specific task, in which MW episodes were recorded while participants watched short video clips
From D2, it was possible to calculate the total number of responses (TR), total number of hits (TH), omitted elements (O), commissions (C), total test effectiveness (TOT) (TR−(O + C)), concentration index (CON) (TH−C), the item with a greater number of tried elements (TR+), the item with a lower number of tried elements (TR−) and the variation index (V)
Summary
There has been a growing interest in the study of mind wandering (MW) within the field of cognitive and clinical neuroscience. In the absence of a specific external stimulus or task, deficits in gamma frequency oscillatory power have been described in cortical areas corresponding to the DMN [51,57] and increases in theta and alpha frequency bands in the posterior cingulate cortex in schizophrenia patients [44]. These findings, combined with previous results [36], confirm differences in EEG modulation between patients with schizophrenia and healthy controls and lead us to the subject of the present work. We expected to find differences in the oscillatory dynamics that accompany the fluctuations between MW and external attention in different cortical regions
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