QEEG-based neural correlates of decision making in a well-trained eight year-old chess player.

Abstract

The neurocognitive substrates of decision making (DM) in the context of chess has appealed to researchers' interest for decades. Expert and beginner chess players are hypothesized to employ different brain functional networks when involved in episodes of critical DM upon chess. Cognitive capacities including, but not restricted to pattern recognition, visuospatial search, reasoning, planning and DM are perhaps the key determinants of rewarding and judgmental decisions in chess. Meanwhile, the precise neural correlates of DM in this context has largely remained elusive. The quantitative electroencephalography (QEEG) is an investigation tool possessing a proper temporal resolution in the study of neural correlates of cognitive tasks at cortical level. Here, we used a 22-channel EEG setup and digital polygraphy in a well-trained 8 year-old boy while engaged in playing chess against the computer. Quantitative analyses were done to map and source-localize the EEG signals. Our analyses indicated a lower power spectral density (PSD) for higher frequency bands in the right hemisphere upon DM-related epochs. Moreover, the information flow upon DM blocks in this particular case was more of posterior towards anterior brain regions.