Internal Attention Research Articles

Using Rapid Invisible Frequency Tagging to track internal attention

Using Rapid Invisible Frequency Tagging to track internal attention

Top-Down Task Goals Induce the Retrieval State.

Engaging the retrieval state (Tulving, 1983) impacts processing and behavior (Long and Kuhl, 2019, 2021; Smith et al., 2022), but the extent to which top-down factors-explicit instructions and goals-versus bottom-up factors-stimulus properties such as repetition and similarity-jointly or independently induce the retrieval state is unclear. Identifying the impact of bottom-up and top-down factors on retrieval state engagement is critical for understanding how control of task-relevant versus task-irrelevant brain states influence cognition. We conducted between-subjects recognition memory tasks on male and female human participants in which we varied test phase goals. We recorded scalp electroencephalography and used an independently validated mnemonic state classifier (Long, 2023) to measure retrieval state engagement as a function of top-down task goals (recognize old vs detect new items) and bottom-up stimulus repetition (hits vs correct rejections (CRs)). We find that whereas the retrieval state is engaged for hits regardless of top-down goals, the retrieval state is only engaged during CRs when the top-down goal is to recognize old items. Furthermore, retrieval state engagement is greater for low compared to high confidence hits when the task goal is to recognize old items. Together, these results suggest that top-down demands to recognize old items induce the retrieval state independent from bottom-up factors, potentially reflecting the recruitment of internal attention to enable access of a stored representation.

EDUCAÇÃO MULTICULTURAL E JOGOS USANDO REALIDADE AUMENTADA NO TDAH

According to recent data, many communities worldwide are multicultural nowadays. Culture is believed to significantly impact the creation of therapy materials, practice models, assessment instruments, and client collaboration. Also, recent works address the interaction between a therapist and a client and the need to understand a child's social needs. Even with significant advancements in the development and delivery of efficient treatments for children with ADHD, ethnic minority youths and teens continue to lag behind their non-minority peers in terms of diagnosis and treatment rates. Various learning and behavioral obstacles are linked to this disorder because of cognitive and metacognitive functioning difficulties. Individuals can only fully integrate into society if these functions have been acquired. Children can acquire alternate strategies to manage their cognitive deficits and adapt to different circumstances by using internal attention to build self-awareness, self-regulation, and self-control. The quick progress of research has led to the development of several medicinal and psychological strategies for treating ADHD, which significantly help with symptom management. The goal of the current study is to gain an understanding of the various therapeutic approaches used to help children from racial and ethnic minorities who are suffering from ADHD. These approaches include games using augmented reality (AR) environments.

The Effect of Attention Focus on Heart Rate During Dart Throws In Recreation Dart Players

The Heart Rate Variability (HRV), which affects dart shot performance, is an important psycho-physiological parameter in that it provides data on the sympathetic also parasympathetic sections of the Central Nervous System. The purpose of the present study was to examine the effect of Internal and External Attention Foci on Heart Rates during dart shot. A total of 34 students, who were studying at Physical Education Sports Sciences Faculty, participated in the study. According to the t-test results, the HF/LF ratio measured under External Attention focus conditions was higher than the HF/LF ratio measured under Internal Attention conditions. This explains that there is a relationship between autonomic nervous system activity and fine motor skill performance. The heart rate changed according to the attention focus during motor skill (p

근원적 인지 메커니즘을 통한 난독증 탐구

Objectives The purpose of this paper is to identify dyslexia among various types of learning disabilities, explain its manifestation mechanism, and demonstrate it clinically.
 Methods This paper shows that through the fundamental cognitive mechanism, not only can the characteristics of dyslexia be understood in the most fundamental, essential, and holistic way, but also a better understanding of how dyslexia is fundamentally manifested. For clinical proof, non-verbal intelligence test (K-CTONI-2), Korean version of Children's Visual Perception Development Test (K-DTVP-3), the Korean Reading Test (KOLRA), and speech hearing test were administered to 7 elementary school students who continued to experience difficulties despite receiving reading education.
 Results Dyslexia begins with an excessively imbalanced structure of the brain's large visual and small auditory cognitive spaces. Due to the imbalance between the two cognitive spaces, visual acuity and visual memory appear strong, while auditory acuity and auditory memory appear weak, resulting in auditory internal attention deficit, which is the most important cognitive condition for language development. Auditory internal attention deficit in turn interferes with auditory information processing, resulting in serious difficulties in written language development and various symptoms observed in dyslexic children. The test results showed a low auditory function score compared to a high visual function score.
 Conclusions Dyslexia occurs due to functional defects in hierarchical cognitive processes such as auditory sensation, memory, and thought processing caused by an imbalance between the brain's small auditory cognitive space and large visual cognitive space. This paper presents directions for effective dyslexia treatment based on research results.

The promotional effect of prosocial motivation on time-based prospective memory.

Time-based prospective memory (TBPM) is the ability to remember to do a planned task at the right time. In social interactions, people are often motivated to do things for others, which reflects an important factor that influences prospective memory, namely prosocial motivation. According to the motivational cognitive model, prosocial motivation promotes TBPM by paying more attention or adopting more effective strategies. This study explored the effect of prosocial motivation on TBPM under different time-monitoring conditions within the motivational cognitive model framework. One hundred and thirty-one university students participated in this experiment that adopted a 2 (groups: control, prosocial motivation) × 2 (viewing time conditions: limited, unlimited) between-subjects design. The results revealed that the prosocial motivation group had better TBPM performance than the control group under both limited and unlimited viewing time conditions. At the same time, compared with the control group, the prosocial motivation group consumed more internal attention and utilized more strategies under both viewing time conditions, and their external attention was more effective. In addition, the external attention of the prosocial motivation group was higher only when time-monitoring was unlimited. The results of this study further extend knowledge of the motivational cognitive model and expand its scope of application, which has theoretical significance.

Microsaccades reflect attention shifts: a mini review of 20 years of microsaccade research.

Microsaccades are small, involuntary eye movements that occur during fixation. Since the 1950s, researchers have conducted extensive research on the role of microsaccades in visual information processing, and found that they also play an important role in human advanced visual cognitive activities. Research over the past 20 years further suggested that there is a close relationship between microsaccades and visual attention, yet lacking a timely review. The current article aims to provide a state-of-the-art review and bring microsaccades studies into the sight of attention research. We firstly introduce basic characteristics about microsaccades, then summarized the empirical evidence supporting the view that microsaccades can reflect both external (perception) and internal (working memory) attention shifts. We finally conclude and highlight three promising avenues for future research.

Internal attention modulates the functional state of novel stimulus-response associations in working memory

Information in working memory (WM) is crucial for guiding behavior. However, not all WM representations are equally relevant simultaneously. Current theoretical frameworks propose a functional dissociation between ‘latent’ and ‘active’ states, in which relevant representations are prioritized into an optimal (active) state to face current demands, while relevant information that is not immediately needed is maintained in a dormant (latent) state. In this context, task demands can induce rapid and flexible prioritization of information from latent to active state. Critically, these functional states have been primarily studied using simple visual memories, with attention selecting and prioritizing relevant representations to serve as templates to guide subsequent behavior. It remains unclear whether more complex WM representations, such as novel stimulus-response associations, can also be prioritized into different functional states depending on their task relevance, and if so how these different formats relate to each other. In the present study, we investigated whether novel WM-guided actions can be brought into different functional states depending on current task demands. Our results reveal that planned actions can be flexibly prioritized when needed and show how their functional state modulates their influence on ongoing behavior. Moreover, they suggest the representations of novel actions of different functional states are maintained in WM via a non-orthogonal coding scheme, thus are prone to interference.

Differences in time-based prospective memory between field-independent and field-dependent cognitive styles under different time monitoring conditions

Time-based prospective memory involves tasks that must be executed at a specific time in the future. Individuals can complete time-based prospective memory tasks using internal attention and external attention. Field-independent and field-dependent cognitive styles are two of the most well-known cognitive styles. Field-independent individuals and field-dependent individuals prefer to use internal reference and external reference to process information, respectively, which implies that there may be differences in the processing mechanisms of the two cognitive styles when performing time-based prospective memory tasks. This study focused on differences in time-based prospective memory performance and processing mechanisms between field-independent and field-dependent cognitive style individuals under different time monitoring conditions. A total of 119 participants were recruited through an Embedded Figure Test and divided into four groups. Time monitoring conditions consisted of a free monitoring condition and a restricted monitoring condition. Participants in the restricted monitoring condition could only press the space bar once, whereas those in the free monitoring condition could check the time at any time and without restrictions. The results of the study showed that field-independent individuals expend less internal and external attention than field-dependent individuals. However, field-independent individuals have higher attention effectiveness and employ more strategies for processing time information. Field-independent individuals were also found to have better time-based prospective memory performance under both time monitoring conditions. Field-dependent individuals did check the time more often under the free monitoring condition, but their time-based prospective memory performance did not benefit from more external attention because although they expended more external attention, they did so less effectively. In short, compared with field-dependent individuals, field-independent individuals had better time-based prospective memory performance under both time monitoring conditions because they have higher attention effectiveness and adopt more strategies for the processing of time information.

Selection of a Neural Network Architecture for Implementation of Cognitive Functions of Network Software for Control of a Group of Interacting Small Space Vehicles

The purpose of the research is to substantiate and select the architecture of a neural network for the possibility of implementing the cognitive functions of network software for controlling a grouping of interacting small spacecraft.Methods are based on the concepts of AI theory for managing the grouping of small spacecraft - the use of adaptive methods and tools that allow making decisions, similar to the mechanisms of human thinking. With regard to space communication systems with a heterogeneous structure, AI methods and technologies are aimed at the processes of predicting the state in communication channels between network nodes and automatic reconfiguration of the network of devices based on the learning processes of a neural network (NN).Results. In the learning and forecasting mode, it is necessary to use time series of parameters and coordinates of specific pairs of small spacecraft with non-zero line of sight. Especially for time series analysis, recurrent neural networks (RNN) are used, in particular, LSTM. The idea of RNN operation is to use as input data for the current forecast not only the state vectors of the SVs and their coordinates, but also the previous value of the communication quality, actual or predictive. The paper shows that the onboard computing power of a separate MSC does not allow performing forecasting and training on board. Therefore, a dedicated ground segment of forecasting and monitoring is required, which will collect a posteriori information, periodically train the cognitive model, use it to predict the quality of communication, and transmit the results to the network nodes to build data transmission routes.Conclusion. The analysis of modern solutions and the choice of neural network architecture for the implementation of the cognitive functions of the network software for controlling the grouping of interacting small spacecraft showed that the neural networks of the Transformer architecture, which are based on the mechanism of internal attention, most fully meet the requirements of the project. The Transformer architecture allows using the entirety of a priori data, has a high learning and forecasting speed.

The Intensity of Internal and External Attention Assessed with Pupillometry.

Not only is visual attention shifted to objects in the external world, attention can also be directed to objects in memory. We have recently shown that pupil size indexes how strongly items are attended externally, which was reflected in more precise encoding into visual working memory. Using a retro-cuing paradigm, we here replicated this finding by showing that stronger pupil constrictions during encoding were reflective of the depth of encoding. Importantly, we extend this previous work by showing that pupil size also revealed the intensity of internal attention toward content stored in visual working memory. Specifically, pupil dilation during the prioritization of one among multiple internally stored representations predicted the precision of the prioritized item. Furthermore, the dynamics of the pupillary responses revealed that the intensity of internal and external attention independently determined the precision of internalized visual representations. Our results show that both internal and external attention are not all-or-none processes, but should rather be thought of as continuous resources that can be deployed at varying intensities. The employed pupillometric approach allows to unravel the intricate interplay between internal and external attention and their effects on visual working memory.

Decoupling of the pupillary light response during internal attention: The modulating effect of luminance intensity

In a world full of sensory stimuli, attention guides us between the external environment and our internal thoughts. While external attention involves processing sensory stimuli, internal attention is devoted to self-generated representations such as planning or spontaneous mind wandering. They both draw from common cognitive resources, thus simultaneous engagement in both often leads to interference between processes. In order to maintain internal focus, an attentional mechanism known as perceptual decoupling takes effect. This mechanism supports internal cognition by decoupling attention from the perception of sensory information. Two previous studies of our lab investigated to what extent perceptual decoupling is evident in voluntary eye movements. Findings showed that the effect is mediated by the internal task modality and workload (visuospatial > arithmetic and high > low, respectively). However, it remains unclear whether it extends to involuntary eye behavior, which may not share cognitive resources with internal activities. Therefore, the present experiment aimed to further elucidate attentional dynamics by examining whether internal attention affects the pupillary light response (PLR). Specifically, we consistently observed that workload and task modality of the internal task reduced the PLR to luminance changes of medium intensity. However, the PLR to strong luminance changes was less or not at all affected by the internal task. These results suggest that perceptual decoupling effects may be less consistent in involuntary eye behavior, particularly in the context of a salient visual stimulus.

Disagreement Matters: Exploring Internal Diversification for Redundant Attention in Generic Facial Action Analysis

This paper demonstrates the effectiveness of a diversification mechanism for building a more robust multi-attention system in generic facial action analysis. While previous multi-attention (e.g., visual attention and self-attention) research on facial expression recognition (FER) and Action Unit (AU) detection have been thoroughly studied to focus on ”external attention diversification”, where attention branches localize different facial areas, we delve into the realm of ”internal attention diversification” and explore the impact of diverse attention patterns within the same Region of Interest (RoI). Our experiments reveal that variability in attention patterns significantly impacts model performance, indicating that unconstrained multi-attention plagued by redundancy and over-parameterization, leading to sub-optimal results. To tackle this issue, we propose a compact module that guides the model to achieve self-diversified multi-attention. Our method is applied to both CNN-based and Transformer-based models, benchmarked on popular databases such as BP4D and DISFA for AU detection, as well as CK+, MMI, BU-3DFE, and BP4D+ for facial expression recognition. We also evaluate the mechanism on Self-attention and Channel-wise attention designs for improving their adaptive capabilities in multi-modal feature fusion tasks. The multi-modal evaluation is conducted on BP4D, BP4D+, and our newly developed large-scale comprehensive emotion database BP4D++, which contains well-synchronized and aligned sensor modalities, addressing the scarcity of annotations and identities in human affective computing. We plan to release the new database to the research community, fostering further advancements in this field.

Study of the internal mechanism of attention focus affecting countermovement jump performance based on muscle synergy theory.

The purpose of this study was to explain the internal mechanism of attention focus affecting performance of countermovement jump based on muscle synergy theory. Participants involved untrained group(N = 10) and high-level group(N = 11). Subjects performed countermovement jump with internal attention focus instruction (IF), external distal attention focus instruction (EDF), and external proximal attention focus instruction (EPF). The electromyography (EMG) signals of the dominant vastus lateralis muscle (VL), semitendinosus muscle (ST), tibial anterior muscle (TA), rectus femoris muscle (RF), and medial gastrocnemius (MG) were recorded. The non-negative matrix factorization was used to extract muscle synergy. 1) Attention focus did not affect countermovement jump performance and the number of muscle synergy in the high-level group (P>0.05). 2) Attention focus instructions affected the untrained group countermovement jump (P<0.05). and EDF and EPF reduced the number of muscle synergy. 3)The Cohen's d of EDF (0.269) was less than EPF (0.377) in untrained group. For the untrained people, the improved motor performance caused by attention focus resembled the adaptive changes that occur with long-term training. The reason why an EDF is superior to EPF is that the former produces more thorough changes in muscle synergy.

Intercultural Education and ADHD: Τhe Use of Virtual Reality as a Means of Intervention and Assessment

People are looking to the digital world for solutions to the challenges they face in their everyday lives, as technology continues to advance rapidly. People with impairments now have equal access to learning opportunities due to technological advancements. ADHD (attention deficit hyperactivity disorder) has become more prevalent among children and teenagers from ethnic minorities in recent years. Due to challenges with cognitive and metacognitive functioning, this condition is associated with various learning and behavioral difficulties. People can only assimilate into the social environment once they have developed these functions. Children can learn alternative techniques to manage their cognitive deficiencies and adapt to various contexts by developing self-awareness, self-regulation, and self-control through internal attention. With the rapid advancement of research, numerous medical and psychological approaches have been developed for the treatment of ADHD, significantly assisting in the management of symptoms. The current study examines different therapeutic strategies aimed at improving the quality of life for children from racial and ethnic minorities who are affected by ADHD. These strategies include video games with virtual reality (VR) environments.

Study on the influence mechanism of perceived benefits on unsafe behavioral decision-making based on ERPs and EROs.

Perceived benefits are considered one of the significant factors affecting an individual's decision-making process. Our study aimed to explore the influence mechanism of perceived benefits in the decision-making process of unsafe behaviors. Our study used the "One Stimulus-Two Key Choice (S-K1/K2)" paradigm to conduct an EEG experiment. Participants (N = 18) made decisions in risky scenarios under high perceived benefits (HPB), low perceived benefits (LPB), and control conditions (CC). Time domain analysis and time-frequency analysis were applied to the recorded EEG data to extract ERPs (event-related potentials) and EROs (event-related oscillations), which include the P3 component, theta oscillations, alpha oscillations, and beta oscillations. Under the HPB condition, the theta power in the central (p = 0.016*) and occipital regions (p = 0.006**) was significantly decreased compared to the CC. Similarly, the alpha power in the frontal (p = 0.022*), central (p = 0.037*), and occipital regions (p = 0.014*) was significantly reduced compared to the CC. Under the LPB condition, theta power in the frontal (p = 0.026*), central (p = 0.028*), and occipital regions (p = 0.010*) was significantly reduced compared to the CC. Conversely, alpha power in the frontal (p = 0.009**), central (p = 0.012*), and occipital regions (p = 0.040*) was significantly increased compared to the HPB condition. The high perceived benefits may reduce individuals' internal attention and evoke individuals' positive emotions and motivation, leading individuals to underestimate risks. Consequently, they exhibited a greater inclination toward unsafe behaviors. However, the low perceived benefits may reduce individuals' memory review, resulting in a simple decision-making process, and they are more inclined to make fast decisions to avoid loss. The research results can help to provide targeted intervention measures, which are beneficial to reducing workers' unsafe behaviors.

A novel positional encoded attention-based Long short-term memory network for state of charge estimation of lithium-ion battery

Accurate estimation of the state of charge (SOC) in battery management systems is critical to the global electrification revolution in various fields. This article introduces a novel long short-term memory (LSTM) network enhanced with positional encoding and a time-step internal attention mechanism for accurate SOC estimation. The proposed method adeptly utilizes positional encoding to transform one-dimensional battery data sequences into a multi-dimensional space through a series of sinusoidal functions parameterized by a diverse frequency spectrum, capturing unique temporal characteristics and relationships inherent in battery data. The enhanced data is then processed by the time-step internal attention, which adeptly discerns interdependencies among input variables at each specific time interval. This dynamic adjustment captures evolving relationships, ensuring a transformed data representation. This enriched data is subsequently processed by the LSTM network, addressing long-term correlations and temporal dynamics. The model was trained and tested on a public dataset that includes the data from different working conditions and temperatures. Primary training followed a leave-one-out (LOO) approach focusing on working conditions, with further validation across temperature variations. Empirical analysis demonstrated that the proposed method surpassing baseline methods, attaining the optimal root mean square error and mean absolute error of 0.91 % and 0.68 % respectively.

Prestimulus alpha power signals attention to retrieval.

The human brain is in distinct processing modes at different times. Specifically, a distinction can be made between encoding and retrieval modes, which refer to the brain's state when it is storing new information or searching for old information, respectively. Recent research proposed the idea of a "ready-to-encode" mode, which describes a prestimulus effect in brain activity that signals (external) attention to encoding and predicts subsequent memory performance. Whether there is also a corresponding "ready-to-retrieve" mode in human brain activity is currently unclear. In this study, we examined whether prestimulus oscillations can be linked to (internal) attention to retrieval. We show that task cues to prepare for retrieval (or testing) in comparison with restudy of previously studied vocabulary word pairs led to a significant decrease of prestimulus alpha power just before the onset of word stimuli. Beamformer analysis localized this effect in the right secondary visual cortex (Brodmann area 18). Correlation analysis showed that the task cue-induced, prestimulus alpha power effect is positively related to stimulus-induced alpha/beta power, which in turn predicted participants' memory performance. The results are consistent with the idea that prestimulus alpha power signals internal attention to retrieval, which promotes the elaborative processing of episodic memories. Future research on brain-computer interfaces may find the findings interesting regarding the potential of using online measures of fluctuating alpha oscillations to trigger the presentation and sequencing of restudy and testing trials, ultimately enhancing instructional learning strategies.

The Imbalance of Wanting and Liking Contributes to a Bias of Internal Attention Towards Positive Consequences of Tobacco Smoking

AbstractPrevious studies have shown that addiction is associated with an attentional bias towards external stimuli. However, it is currently unclear whether this bias extends to internal attention. The aim of the present study was to address this question within the Incentive Sensitization theory framework. To this end, structural equation models delineating the relationships between nicotine dependence, the imbalance of wanting and liking (WmL), personal relevance of smoking consequences, and antismoking intention were tested using online survey data of 826 tobacco users. Consistent with previous findings, WmL was disrupted with increasing nicotine dependence. The key finding was that a moderate positive correlation was observed between WmL and personal relevance of positive consequences, which suggests that dependence-related attentional bias might not only relate to the processing of external stimuli but also to what an individual considers important, which is linked to the distribution of internal attention. However, such attentional bias might not apply to all smokers to the same extent, based on the comparison of latent profiles of smokers. The findings indicate that the bias of internal attention may play a significant role in both the initiation of smoking cessation, as well as in the likelihood of relapse. This suggests that including a more diverse array of topics in health communication could be beneficial, given the varying emphasis on smoking consequences among different profiles.

The Processing Mechanism of Repetitive Practice Affecting Time-Based Prospective Memory.

Time-based prospective memory (TBPM) refers to performing intended actions at a specific time in the future. The TBPM task is very common in daily life, and whether it can be successfully completed can affect our quality of life. Repeated behavior training can usually improve social cognitive performance, and this study focused on exploring whether TBPM performance could improve with repeated behavior training. Meanwhile, we also focused on whether behavior training could reduce attention consumption, both internal and external, attention on TBPM tasks. In this study, a single-factor between-subject design was adopted. Seventy-three undergraduates were assigned to three groups: the control group, the baseline group, and the experimental group. The baseline group only needs to perform ongoing tasks, so the ongoing task performance of the control group will not be affected by TBPM tasks. The control group needs to perform both ongoing and TBPM tasks without practice. The experimental group needs to perform both ongoing and TBPM tasks after 30 exercises. The ongoing task is a typical working memory task. The TBPM task was to press a "1" button every 1 min. The results showed that the performance of ongoing tasks in the baseline group, experimental group, and control group decreased sequentially, and the experimental group had less time monitoring than the control group. The results indicated that behavior training could reduce attention consumption in both internal attention and external attention, but it could not reach the level of automatic processing.