Abstract
Visual information about the location of an upcoming target can be used to prepare an appropriate motor response and reduce its reaction time. Here, we investigated the brain mechanisms associated with the reliability of directional information used for motor preparation. We recorded brain activity using magnetoencephalography (MEG) during a delayed reaching task in which a visual cue provided valid information about the location of the upcoming target with 50, 75, or 100% reliability. We found that reaction time increased as cue reliability decreased and that trials with invalid cues had longer reaction times than trials with valid cues. MEG channel analysis showed that during the late cue period the power of the beta-band from left mid-anterior channels, contralateral to the responding hand, correlated with the reliability of the cue. This effect was source localized over a large motor-related cortical and subcortical network. In addition, during invalid-cue trials there was a phasic increase of theta-band power following target onset from left posterior channels, localized to the left occipito-parietal cortex. Furthermore, the theta-beta cross-frequency coupling between left mid-occipital and motor cortex transiently increased before responses to invalid-cue trials. In conclusion, beta-band power in motor-related areas reflected the reliability of directional information used during motor preparation, whereas phasic theta-band activity may have signaled whether the target was at the expected location or not. These results elucidate mechanisms of interaction between attentional and motor processes.
Highlights
A key function of cognition is the integration of information for predictive processing (Bubic et al, 2010)
Reaction Time and Movement Time We found no significant change of mean reaction time (RT) due to block order [F(2, 396) = 0.556, p = 0.574], sub-block of trials [F(11, 396) = 1.319, p = 0.211], or their interaction [F(22, 396) = 0.997, p = 0.467]
The generalized linear mixed models (GLMM) analysis showed that, as expected, it decreased significantly as cue reliability increased [F(2, 55) = 15.706, p < 0.001], and that it was significantly shorter for valid-cue trials than for invalid-cue trials [F(1, 55) = 18.427, p < 0.001]
Summary
A key function of cognition is the integration of information for predictive processing (Bubic et al, 2010). Neural Encoding of Directional Reliability the reliability of the information the cue conveys, the greater the reduction in response latency to correctly anticipated targets (Jonides, 1980; Posner et al, 1980; Eriksen and Yeh, 1985; Risko and Stolz, 2010; Arjona et al, 2016; Kuhns et al, 2017; Valakos et al, 2020) In this context, motor planning and spatial attention are inherently linked (Goldberg and Segraves, 1987; Rizzolatti et al, 1987; Rushworth et al, 2003; Brown et al, 2011; Perfetti et al, 2011), and several studies have shown that the frontoparietal neural network associated with motor preparation overlaps to a large extent with the network associated with spatial attention (Goldberg and Segraves, 1987; Corbetta et al, 1998; Nobre et al, 2000; Moore and Fallah, 2001; Rushworth et al, 2003; Balser et al, 2014; Denis et al, 2017). We can expect that changing the reliability of information provided by visual cues regarding an upcoming motor response will be reflected in changes of neural activity in the frontoparietal networks associated with motor control and spatial attention
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