Midfrontal theta as moderator between beta oscillations and precision control

Abstract

Control of movements using visual information is crucial for many daily activities, and such visuomotor control has been revealed to be supported by alpha and beta cortical oscillations. However, it has been remained to be unclear how midfrontal theta and occipital gamma oscillations, which are associated with high-level cognitive functions, would be involved in this process to facilitate performance. Here we addressed this fundamental open question in healthy young adults by measuring high-density cortical activity during a precision force-matching task. We manipulated the amount of error by changing visual feedback gain (low, medium, and high visual gains) and analyzed event-related spectral perturbations. Increasing the visual feedback gain resulted in a decrease in force error and variability. There was an increase in theta synchronization in the midfrontal area and also in beta desynchronization in the sensorimotor and posterior parietal areas with higher visual feedback gains. Gamma de/synchronization was not evident during the task. In addition, we found a moderation effect of midfrontal theta on the positive relationship between the beta oscillations and force error. Subsequent simple slope analysis indicated that the effect of beta oscillations on force error was weaker when midfrontal theta was high. Our findings suggest that the midfrontal area signals the increased need of cognitive control to refine behavior by modulating the visuomotor processing at theta frequencies.