Sensory Attention Research Articles

Being alone together: yoga, bodywork, and intimate sociality in American households

Using ethnographic data from Providence County, Rhode Island, this paper explores yoga as a bodywork practice that is part of everyday health and wellbeing routines in middle class households. In this context, participants define their bodywork practices as individual activities that answer health and wellbeing needs, but notably discuss bodywork in terms of their everyday social experience. Along with other bodywork activities, yoga emerges as a shared social practice that links participants to their partners, children, and other intimates, facilitating a sense of togetherness by allowing time and space for autonomy. By giving atmospheric and sensory attention to the ethnographic data, the paper further reveals how domestic intimacy is cultivated via the generation of bodily heat and positive energies and that yoga may tacitly facilitate such atmospheres. In this way, yoga can help households meet an American need for self-development and autonomy while still facilitating a far more enduring human need for intimate connection. Ultimately yoga is characterized as a pragmatic bodywork practice that blends self-development and social intimacy through shared energetic encounters.

Contribution of the basal forebrain to corticocortical network interactions

Basal forebrain (BF) cholinergic neurons provide the cerebral cortex with acetylcholine. Despite the long-established involvement of these cells in sensory processing, attention, and memory, the mechanisms by which cholinergic signaling regulates cognitive processes remain elusive. In this study, we recorded spiking and local field potential data simultaneously from several locations in the BF, and sites in the orbitofrontal and visual cortex in transgenic ChAT-Cre rats performing a visual discrimination task. We observed distinct differences in the fine spatial distributions of gamma coherence values between specific basalo-cortical and cortico-cortical sites that shifted across task phases. Additionally, cholinergic firing induced spatial changes in cortical gamma power, and optogenetic activation of BF increased coherence between specific cortico-cortical sites, suggesting that the cholinergic system contributes to selective modulation of cortico-cortical circuits. Furthermore, the results suggest that cells in specific BF locations are dynamically recruited across behavioral epochs to coordinate interregional cortical processes underlying cognition.

Efficient training of mice on the 5-choice serial reaction time task in an automated rodent training system

Experiments aiming to understand sensory-motor systems, cognition and behavior necessitate training animals to perform complex tasks. Traditional training protocols require lab personnel to move the animals between home cages and training chambers, to start and end training sessions, and in some cases, to hand-control each training trial. Human labor not only limits the amount of training per day, but also introduces several sources of variability and may increase animal stress. Here we present an automated training system for the 5-choice serial reaction time task (5CSRTT), a classic rodent task often used to test sensory detection, sustained attention and impulsivity. We found that full automation without human intervention allowed rapid, cost-efficient training, and decreased stress as measured by corticosterone levels. Training breaks introduced only a transient drop in performance, and mice readily generalized across training systems when transferred from automated to manual protocols. We further validated our automated training system with wireless optogenetics and pharmacology experiments, expanding the breadth of experimental needs our system may fulfill. Our automated 5CSRTT system can serve as a prototype for fully automated behavioral training, with methods and principles transferrable to a range of rodent tasks.

The Role of Phonological, Auditory Sensory and Cognitive Skills on Word Reading Acquisition: A Cross-Linguistic Study.

Despite considerable evidence regarding the influence of orthography on reading processing, the impact of orthographic depth on reading predictors remains unclear. In addition, it also remains unknown the role of the orthography in the influence of auditory temporal processing and attention skills on word reading skills. The current study investigates the word reading predictors in a group of British and Brazilian children with typical development considering phonological, auditory sensory, short-term memory, and sustained attention skills. Rhyme and Alliteration skills predicted word reading in both groups; however, the correlation in the British group was more robust. Short-term memory was also correlated with reading in both groups; however, it was a significant word reading predictor only in the British group. The auditory sensory was not directly correlated with word reading in either group; however, it was involved with Rhyme and Alliteration performance only in the British group. Those results were discussed considering the complexity of the phonological structure and opaque orthography in English when compared to Portuguese, which indicates that the less transparent the orthography, the higher the importance of factors such as phonological awareness, short-term memory, and to some extent, auditory sensory processing skills on word reading acquisition. Those results emphasize the need to consider orthography and phonological features of a particular language when developing a reading assessment and treatments.

EEG Correlates of Preparatory and Executive Attention during the Performance of Tasks with Various Directionalities of Attention

EEG has been studied in the nonstationary mode of cognitive tasks. In this mode, cognitive task performance is reduced to seconds, cognitive activity is repeated many times, the stages of short-term dominance of externally oriented (sensory) attention are followed by stages of longer dominance of either sensory or internally oriented (mental) attention. Previously, the stationary mode was used, in which the subjects were for a long time either in the state of dominance of sensory attention or in the state of dominance of mental attention. The non-stationary mode is close to real learning modes, including the use of electronic education techniques. The non-stationary mode also allows the comparison of EEG correlates of mental and sensory attention dominance at different stages of cognitive task performance. An analysis of preliminary data shows that, at the stage of preparatory attention, the EEG differences between tasks with a dominance of mental attention and with a dominance of sensory attention are much smaller than the differences at the stage of executive attention, which suggests non-specificity of the nature of preparatory attention.

Infant Attentional behaviors Are Associated With ADHD Symptomatology and Executive Function in Early Childhood

Objective: We explored associations between infant attentional behaviors as measured by the First Year Inventory (FYIv2.0) and dimensional ratings of ADHD symptomatology and executive function (EF) in early childhood. Methods: This study included parents (N = 229) who filled out the FYIv2.0 when their children were 12 months of age. When children were approximately 54 months (4.5 years) of age, parents completed reports of children’s ADHD symptomatology and EF abilities. Correlation and regression analyses were conducted among measures. Results: We found significant associations among the variables of interest, both cross-sectionally and longitudinally, as well as gender differences. Notably, non-social sensory attention (NSA) was significantly related to 54-month ADHD symptom severity. All three 12-month attention variables were significantly related to 54-month EF. Conclusion: Results suggest that infant attentional behaviors predict later ADHD-related behaviors in early childhood. Future research should explore associations using laboratory-based measures and could inform early intervention efforts.

Sensory focused exercise improves anxiety in Parkinson's disease: A randomized controlled trial.

Anxiety has been implicated as one of the greatest influences on quality of life in Parkinson’s disease (PD). The etiology of anxiety is unclear, although previous work suggests that anxiety may be linked to sensory deficits that cause uncertainty in movement. Thus, the current study examined whether focusing attention on sensory feedback during goal-based exercise has the potential to provide benefits to anxiety in PD. Thirty-five participants with PD were randomized to either a Sensory Attention Focused Exercise (SAFEx) (i.e. internal focus of attention, n = 18) or Sham Exercise control (i.e. external focus of attention, n = 17) and completed 33 one-hour attention-based exercise sessions over 11-weeks. Before and after the program (pre and post), participants completed the Parkinson Anxiety Scale (PAS) questionnaire. The PAS includes three anxiety sections: persistent, episodic, and avoidance. Changes in the total PAS score and within each section of the PAS were subjected to two-factor mixed repeated measures ANCOVA. Significant group by time interactions demonstrated that from pre to post, total PAS scores (p = 0.007) and episodic anxiety scores (p = 0.010) significantly decreased in the SAFEx group only (ΔTotal PAS = -5.2, F(1,27) = 5.41, p = 0.028, ηp2 = 0.17; ΔEpisodic Score = -1.8, F(1,27) = 6.89, p = 0.014, ηp2 = 0.20). In conclusion, focusing attention on sensory feedback while completing goal-based exercises may provide significant benefits to improving anxiety in PD. As such, sensory attention focused exercise may be a critical adjunct therapy for improving anxiety, and ultimately quality of life in people with PD.

When to Make the Sensory Social: Registering in Face‐to‐Face Openings

This article analyzes naturally occurring video‐recorded openings during which participants make the sensory social through the action of registering—calling joint attention to a selected, publicly perceivable referent so others shift their sensory attention to it. It examines sequence‐initial actions that register referents for which a participant is regarded as responsible. Findings demonstrate a systematic preference organization which observably guides when and how people initiate registering sequences sensitive to ownership of, and displayed stance toward, the target referent. Analysis shows how registering an owned referent achieves intersubjectivity and puts involved participants' face, affiliation, and social relationship on the line. A video abstract is available at https://youtu.be/rNL70vawG3o

Crossmodal attentive skill learner: learning in Atari and beyond with audio–video inputs

This paper introduces the Crossmodal Attentive Skill Learner (CASL), integrated with the recently-introduced Asynchronous Advantage Option-Critic architecture [Harb et al. in When waiting is not an option: learning options with a deliberation cost. arXiv preprint arXiv:1709.04571, 2017] to enable hierarchical reinforcement learning across multiple sensory inputs. Agents trained using our approach learn to attend to their various sensory modalities (e.g., audio, video) at the appropriate moments, thereby executing actions based on multiple sensory streams without reliance on supervisory data. We demonstrate empirically that the sensory attention mechanism anticipates and identifies useful latent features, while filtering irrelevant sensor modalities during execution. Further, we provide concrete examples in which the approach not only improves performance in a single task, but accelerates transfer to new tasks. We modify the Arcade Learning Environment [Bellemare et al. in J Artif Intell Res 47:253–279, 2013] to support audio queries (ALE-audio code available at https://github.com/shayegano/Arcade-Learning-Environment), and conduct evaluations of crossmodal learning in the Atari 2600 games H.E.R.O. and Amidar. Finally, building on the recent work of Babaeizadeh et al. [in: International conference on learning representations (ICLR), 2017], we open-source a fast hybrid CPU–GPU implementation of CASL (CASL code available at https://github.com/shayegano/CASL).

Icephery and Icy Score - concepts for multi sensory approach

Introduction For years during the darkest moment of the year, I have photographed the reflections of light in the cracks of ice on a remote frozen lake in Eastern Finland. At first glance it may seem that there is only ice, snow and some light. And this is the case in some point of view, but the more detailed focusing widens the view. This exposition describes how by carefully multisensory reading the environment – here by reading the auditive and thermoception information - is organized and is in continuous moving process. My key concepts are Icephery and The Icy Score which I have created by analyzing what kind of information my thermoception and auditive orientations will give about the ice and the icy environment. In this presentation the other senses are less attentive. Those I have opened in my previous investigations (see Timonen 2014, 2019). By concentrating the multisensory close-reading the place gets new meanings and layers. The place that while ago was peripheral, remote and silence are now near with full of meanings and sounds. The understanding created by the sensory attention pushes the borders of periphery of the place in a constant float. The article proceeds by presenting the theoretical starting points of the research, then describing the concrete workplace on ice from the point of view of the place and materiality and then presenting the concepts the Icephery and the Icy score as a result of carefully multi sensory close-reading. The Icy Score is a visual outcome of the auditive layers of the ice.

Task-Related Sensorimotor Adjustments Increase the Sensory Range in Electrolocation.

Perception and motor control traditionally are studied separately. However, motor activity can serve as a scaffold to shape the sensory flow. This tight link between motor actions and sensing is particularly evident in active sensory systems. Here, we investigate how the weakly electric mormyrid fish Gnathonemus petersii of undetermined sex structure their sensing and motor behavior while learning a perceptual task. We find systematic adjustments of the motor behavior that correlate with an increased performance. Using a model to compute the electrosensory input, we show that these behavioral adjustments improve the sensory input. As we find low neuronal detection thresholds at the level of medullary electrosensory neurons, it seems that the behavior-driven improvements of the sensory input are highly suitable to overcome the sensory limitations, thereby increasing the sensory range. Our results show that motor control is an active component of sensory learning, demonstrating that a detailed understanding of contribution of motor actions to sensing is needed to understand even seemingly simple behaviors.SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT Motor-guided sensation and perception are intertwined, with motor behavior serving as a scaffold to shape the sensory input. We characterized how the weakly electric mormyrid fish Gnathonemus petersii, as it learns a perceptual task, restructures its sensorimotor behavior. We find that systematic adjustments of the motor behavior correlate with increased performance and a shift of the sensory attention of the animal. Analyzing the afferent electrosensory input shows that a significant gain in information results from these sensorimotor adjustments. Our results show that motor control can be an active component of sensory learning. Researching the sensory corollaries of motor control thus can be crucial to understand sensory sensation and perception under naturalistic conditions.

The transparency of experience and the neuroscience of attention

According to the thesis of transparency, subjects can attend only to the representational content of perceptual experience, never to the intrinsic properties of experience that carry this representational content, i.e., to “mental paint.” So far, arguments for and against transparency were conducted from the armchair, relying mainly on introspective observations. In this paper, we argue in favor of transparency, relying on the cognitive neuroscience of attention. We present a trilemma to those who hold that attention can be directed to mental paint. Such attention is either first-order sensory, higher-order cognitive, or higher-order sensory attention. We argue that the notion of first-order sensory attention to mental paint is incompatible with the neuroscience of sensory attention; that higher-order cognitive attention to mental paint is irrelevant to transparency; and that the notion of higher-order sensory attention to mental paint has an apparently incoherent prediction. Via elimination, these considerations support the thesis of transparency.

A division of labor between power and phase coherence in encoding attention to stimulus streams

Both time-based (when) and feature-based (what) aspects of attention facilitate behavior, so it is natural to hypothesize additive effects. We tested this conjecture by recording response behavior and electroencephalographic (EEG) data to auditory pitch changes, embedded at different time lags in a continuous sound stream. Participants reacted more rapidly to larger rather than smaller feature change magnitudes (deviancy), as well as to changes appearing after longer rather than shorter waiting times (hazard rate of response times). However, the feature and time dimensions of attention separately contributed to response speed, with no significant interaction. Notably, phase coherence at low frequencies (delta and theta bands, 1–7 Hz) predominantly reflected attention capture by feature changes, while oscillatory power at higher frequency bands, alpha (8–12 Hz) and beta (13–25 Hz) reflected the orienting of attention in time. Power and phase coherence predicted different portions of response speed variance, suggesting a division of labor in encoding sensory attention in complex auditory scenes.

Value-driven attentional capture is modulated by the contents of working memory: An EEG study.

Attention and working memory (WM) have previously been shown to interact closely when sensory information is being maintained. However, when non-sensory information is maintained in WM, the relationship between WM and sensory attention may be less strong. In the current study, we used electroencephalography to evaluate whether value-driven attentional capture (i.e., allocation of attention to a task-irrelevant feature previously associated with a reward) and its effects on either sensory or non-sensory WM performance might be greater than the effects of salient, non-reward-associated stimuli. In a training phase, 19 participants learned to associate a color with reward. Then, participants were presented with squares and encoded their locations into WM. Participants were instructed to convert the spatial locations either to another type of sensory representation or to an abstract, relational type of representation. During the WM delay period, task-irrelevant distractors, either previously-rewarded or non-rewarded, were presented, with a novel color distractor in the other hemifield. The results revealed lower alpha power and larger N2pc amplitude over posterior electrode sides contralateral to the previously rewarded color, compared to ipsilateral. These effects were mainly found during relational WM, compared to sensory WM, and only for the previously rewarded distractor color, compared to a previous non-rewarded target color or novel color. These effects were associated with modulations of WM performance. These results appear to reflect less capture of attention during maintenance of specific location information, and suggest that value-driven attentional capture can be mitigated as a function of the type of information maintained in WM.

Perception of Aversive Auditory Stimuli Is Different in Sensory Modulation Disorder and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder.

This study examined whether sensory modulation disorder-sensory overresponsivity (SMD-SOR) and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) have a significant effect on the perception of aversive auditory stimuli. Participants were 66 young adult women. The diagnosis of SOR was made using the Sensory Responsiveness Questionnaire, and ADHD was diagnosed by a qualified psychiatrist or neurologist using criteria from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (4th ed., text rev.). Participants were presented with the Battery of Aversiveness to Sounds, short presentations of daily life sounds, and rated each sound stimulus verbally according to its perceived unpleasantness. Participants with SOR rated low-intensity aversive sounds as significantly more aversive than participants without SOR. High-intensity sounds obtained a marginal significant difference exclusively in participants with ADHD. The perception of aversive auditory stimuli in adults with SOR appears to be unique and different than the profile of adults with ADHD.

EEG-Correlates of Mental Attention are Modified by Presence of Specifying Visual Signals

This work continues the study of EEG-correlates of cognitive states with different contributions of sensory and mental attention. The design of the experiments was similar to that used for investigations of evoked EEG activity, but we analyzed spectral power parameters of quasi-stationary EEGs. Tests for sensory attention and for mental attention (productive and reproductive imaginary) were presented in blocks of 80 probes each. Each probe contained 2 signals: visually presented words designated an object of sensory or mental task in the probe, then a presentation of an image started a process of memorization, a presentation of a white screen started either a process of recollection, or a process of imaging. The evaluations of EEG spectral power in the states of sensory and mental attention and their comparison with the reference state of rest showed that the very scheme of a test with multiple inclusions of visual stimuli to trigger and to direct mental activities produced a specific functional state of rapid switching between the dominants of external and internal attention. The EEG correlates of mental states were rather different as compared with the EEG correlates obtained in extended uninterrupted states of mental attention.

Children’s appraisals of interparental conflict predict event-related potential components

ABSTRACT Interparental conflict and neural correlates of children’s emotion processing were examined. Event-related potential (ERP) data were collected from 87 children (9–11 years old) with stimuli depicting interpersonal anger, happiness, and neutrality. Three ERP components were modulated by child-reported measures of conflict, reflecting a progression from early sensory attention to cognitive control to stimulus categorization. Negative conflict predicted larger N1 and N2 amplitudes on happy than on angry trials. Greater self-blame for conflict predicted larger N2 amplitudes across emotions and larger P3 amplitudes on angry than on neutral or happy trials. Results suggest conflict-related experiences shape processing of interpersonal emotion.

GPU-based high-performance computing of multichannel EEG phase wavelet synchronization.

The work is devoted to GPU-based high performance realization of algorithm for wavelet phase synchronization. Wavelet phase coherence was applied for analyzing brain activity in states with different degrees of mental and sensory attention. In the analysis of electroencephalographic correlates of mental states, as a rule the focus is on the analysis of the spectral power of a quasi-stationary EEG or task-related power of time-frequency EEG spectra. The analysis of the wavelet phase coherence provides additional information on the organization of brain activity, but requires more computing time. Fast implementation can simplify the use of this method in practice.

청지각 훈련과 병행한 감각통합치료가 발달지연 아동의 감각처리, 시 지각 발달, 주의집중에 미치는 영향 : 개별실험연구

청지각 훈련과 병행한 감각통합치료가 발달지연 아동의 감각처리, 시 지각 발달, 주의집중에 미치는 영향 : 개별실험연구

Autopilot, Mind Wandering, and the Out of the Loop Performance Problem.

To satisfy the increasing demand for safer critical systems, engineers have integrated higher levels of automation, such as glass cockpits in aircraft, power plants, and driverless cars. These guiding principles relegate the operator to a monitoring role, increasing risks for humans to lack system understanding. The out of the loop performance problem arises when operators suffer from complacency and vigilance decrement; consequently, when automation does not behave as expected, understanding the system or taking back manual control may be difficult. Close to the out of the loop problem, mind wandering points to the propensity of the human mind to think about matters unrelated to the task at hand. This article reviews the literature related to both mind wandering and the out of the loop performance problem as it relates to task automation. We highlight studies showing how these phenomena interact with each other while impacting human performance within highly automated systems. We analyze how this proximity is supported by effects observed in automated environment, such as decoupling, sensory attention, and cognitive comprehension decrease. We also show that this link could be useful for detecting out of the loop situations through mind wandering markers. Finally, we examine the limitations of the current knowledge because many questions remain open to characterize interactions between out of the loop, mind wandering, and automation.