Synchronization Hypothesis Research Articles

A California sea lion (Zalophus californianus) can keep the beat: Motor entrainment to rhythmic auditory stimuli in a non vocal mimic.

Is the ability to entrain motor activity to a rhythmic auditory stimulus, that is "keep a beat," dependent on neural adaptations supporting vocal mimicry? That is the premise of the vocal learning and synchronization hypothesis, recently advanced to explain the basis of this behavior (A. Patel, 2006, Musical Rhythm, Linguistic Rhythm, and Human Evolution, Music Perception, 24, 99-104). Prior to the current study, only vocal mimics, including humans, cockatoos, and budgerigars, have been shown to be capable of motoric entrainment. Here we demonstrate that a less vocally flexible animal, a California sea lion (Zalophus californianus), can learn to entrain head bobbing to an auditory rhythm meeting three criteria: a behavioral response that does not reproduce the stimulus; performance transfer to a range of novel tempos; and entrainment to complex, musical stimuli. These findings show that the capacity for entrainment of movement to rhythmic sounds does not depend on a capacity for vocal mimicry, and may be more widespread in the animal kingdom than previously hypothesized.

The deficit-reduction debate in the USA: an investigation of cointegration and causality

The most recent financial crisis and the great recession have led to renewed questioning of the US fiscal deficit problem. This study revisits the relationship between government expenditures and revenues in the USA using the most recent datasets. It examines the long run relationship between spending and revenue by testing for integration using Engle-Granger and Johansen-Juselius methods of cointegration. Results from cointegration tests suggest that a long run relationship between expenditures and revenues exists in the USA. The Granger causality tests indicate that there is a bidirectional causal relationship between the two variables. Not only do the expenditures cause revenues but revenues in turn cause spending in the USA. The finding strongly supports the fiscal synchronisation hypothesis proposed by

Revisiting the Government Revenue-Expenditure Nexus: Evidence from Nigeria Based on the VAR Granger Causality Approach

The relationship between government revenue and government expenditure is important, given its relevance for policy especially with respect to the budget deficit. The purpose of this study is to examine the structure of federal government revenue and expenditure in Nigeria, from 1961-2010. It investigates the causal relationship between government revenue and government expenditure, using Granger causality test through cointegrated vector autoregression (VAR) methods; so as to determine whether the tax-spend hypothesis, spend-tax hypothesis, fiscal synchronization hypothesis, or the fiscal neutrality hypothesis hold in the relationship between government revenue and expenditure for Nigeria. The result shows that there is a bi-directional causality between government revenue and government expenditure. The outcome of the bi-directional causality between government revenue and expenditure supports the fiscal synchronization hypothesis. This therefore, suggest that the federal government should not make spending-tax decisions in isolation of tax-spend decisions. This is because the joint determination of revenues and expenditures is appealing as long as it effectively restrains the budget deficit. Therefore, efforts at enhancing sources of revenue should be accompanied by reductions in government spending for Nigeria.

Panel data modelling and the tax-spend controversy in the euro zone

This article attempts to differentiate between the debatable tax and spend, spend and tax, fiscal synchronization and institutional separation hypotheses in order to explore empirically the interplay between public expenditures and public revenues in the Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) member states. For this purpose, panel data models are derived to test the validity of the four hypotheses in EMU countries. A notable characteristic of this article is that the four hypotheses are tested by dividing EMU countries into various subgroups and using disaggregated data for government expenditures and revenues. Seeking for the robustness of the empirical evidence, the panel data methods of Generalized Two-Stage Least Squares (GTSLS) and Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) are accordingly applied to identify the relationship between public outlays and taxation receipts. GTSLS and GMM results strongly support the fiscal synchronization hypothesis implying that budget decision-making is significantly influenced by both government expenditures and revenues components.

Asymmetries in the revenue–expenditure nexus: A tale of three countries

The objective of this paper is to examine the government revenue and expenditure relationship in the context of what is known as the soft and hard budget constraint strategy. We adopt a nonlinear framework with structural breaks and focus our empirical analysis in three countries. Two of them represent the two extremes of polities in the EU: Sweden and Greece and the third, Germany is used for comparison purposes. Our results indicate absence of any asymmetries, TAR or MTAR, for Sweden and Germany. The symmetric ECM provides support for the fiscal synchronization hypothesis of revenues and expenditures in both countries. For Greece, however, we find evidence for asymmetries of the MTAR form, which in turn support the spend-and-tax hypothesis with asymmetric adjustment towards the long-run equilibrium. This indicates that the Greek fiscal authorities would cut deficits only if they exceeded a high “trigger” threshold, which gives support to the soft budget constraint strategy to gain political support. The fiscal adjustment takes place by cutting government expenditure. The out-of-sample forecast results suggest that a shift from a univariate model specification to a multivariate model improves marginally the forecast performance.

Synchronization of polar climate variability over the last ice age: in search of simple rules at the heart of climate's complexity

Evidence is presented supporting the hypothesis of polar synchronization, which states that during the last ice age, and likely in earlier times, millennial-scale temperature changes of the north and south Polar Regions were coupled and synchronized. The term synchronization as used here describes how two or more coupled nonlinear oscillators adjust their (initially different) natural rhythms to a common frequency and constant relative phase. In the case of the Polar Regions heat and mass transfer through the intervening ocean and atmosphere provided the coupling. As a working hypothesis, polar synchronization brings new insights into the dynamic processes that link Greenland9s Dansgaard-Oeschger (DO) abrupt temperature fluctuations to Antarctic temperature variability. It is shown that, consistent with the presence of polar synchronization, the time series of the most representative abrupt climate events of the last glaciation recorded in Greenland and Antarctica can be transformed into one another by a π/2 phase shift, with Antarctica temperature variations leading Greenland9s. This, plus the fact that remarkable close simulations of the time series are obtained with a model consisting of a few nonlinear differential equations suggest the intriguing possibility that there are simple rules governing the complex behavior of global paleoclimate.

The Causality between Government Revenue and Government Expenditure in Iran

The causal relationship between government revenue and government expenditure is an important subject in public economics especially to the control of budget deficit. The purpose of this study is to investigate the relationship between government revenue and government expenditure in Iran by applying the bounds testing approach to cointegration. The results of the causality test show that there is a bidirectional causal relationship between government expenditure and revenues in both long run and short run. Therefore, the results of this paper are consistent with fiscal synchronization hypothesis. The policy implication of results suggests that because of existing interdependence relation between government expenditure and revenue, the government makes its expenditures and revenues decision simultaneously. Under this hypothesis, the fiscal authorities of Iran should try to increase revenues and decrease expenditure simultaneously to control the budget deficits.

Solving the Binding Problem with Separated Extraction of Information by Oscillatory Self-Organizing Maps

One solution to the binding problem is the hypothesis that property binding should be represented by phaselocking among neuronal oscillatory firing. We introduce this synchronous firing hypothesis into the selforganizing maps, or SOMs. Here we propose oscillatory self-organizing maps. Using the computer simulation, we show that our model composed of the oscillatory SOMs can separate and extract information of the shapes and the colors from two simultaneous inputs, solving the binding problem.

The Synchronous Oscillation Hypothesis

The Synchronous Oscillation Hypothesis

Carl G. Jung’s Synchronicity and Quantum Entanglement: Schrödinger’s Cat ‘Wanders’ Between Chromosomes

One of the most prospective directions of study of C.G. Jung's synchronicity phenomenon is reviewed considering the latest achievements of modern science. The attention is focused mainly on the quantum entanglement and related phenomena - quantum coherence and quantum superposition. It is shown that the quantum non-locality capable of solving the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen paradox represents one of the most adequate physical mechanisms in terms of conformity with the Jung's synchronicity hypothesis. An attempt is made on psychophysiological substantiation of synchronicity within the context of molecular biology. An original concept is proposed, stating that biological molecules involved in cell division during mitosis and meiosis, particularly DNA may be considered material carriers of consciousness. This assumption may be formulated on the basis of phenomenology of Jung's analytical psychology

The Relationship between Tax Revenues and Government Expenditures in European Union and Non-European Union OECD Countries

This article examines the causal relationship between tax revenues and government expenditures in twenty-two OECD countries, eleven European Union (EU) member states, and eleven non-EU. We use the Autorgressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) bounds test and the Toda-Yamamoto Granger noncausality approach to test for causality. The results show that the long-run and short-run causal patterns differ across these groups within the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). For the long-run causal patterns, we find evidence to confirm the tax-and-spend hypothesis in eight of the twenty-two countries; but the evidence is more prevalent within the EU countries, where tax burdens are much higher, than in the non-EU OECD countries. In addition, the long-run causality results also confirm the institutional separation hypothesis in twelve countries, with two-thirds coming from the non-EU OECD countries. While we have no evidence to support the fiscal synchronization hypothesis in the long run, the short-run results show evidence of fiscal synchronization in five out of twenty-two countries.

On a test statistic for the Kuramoto order parameter of synchronization: An illustration for group synchronization during rocking chairs

We discuss a quantitative approach to detect phase synchronization in noisy experimental multivariate data. To this end, we derive a test statistic based on the Kuramoto order parameter. We derive criteria for rejecting the null hypothesis of zero phase synchronization at given significance levels. We apply the test statistic to a recently conducted study on group behavior that used a rocking chair paradigm. In this context, we quantify the emergence of phase synchronization within small groups of participants.

Galling arthropod diversity in adjacent swamp forests and restinga vegetation in Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil

Galling arthropods create plant structures inside which they find shelter. Factors acting on galler diversity are still being discussed, with this fauna considered more diverse in xeric than mesic environments (higrothermic stress hypothesis, HSH), and also in more plant diverse sites. Here we compare galler abundance (N), equitability (E), species richness (S) and composition between adjacent restinga (xeric) and swamp forests (mesic) in Parque Estadual de Itapeva (29°21' S, 49°45' W), Rio Grande do Sul, southern Brazil. Five trails, two in swamp forest and three in restingas, were sampled four times each (January/December 2005). After an effort of 60h/person, 621 galled plant individuals belonging to 104 gall morphotypes were recorded. This suggests a high galler diversity for the Park, comparable to the richest places known. No differences were found for N, E or S between restingas and swamp forests. However, faunal composition differs significantly between the vegetation types. The dominant (most abundant) species are different in either vegetation type, and are rare or absent on the other vegetation type. Such species composition analysis is still largely ignored for gallers, and stresses the fact that the HSH cannot explain this pattern, since the latter is based on preferences by the ovipositing galler for xeric sites instead of mesic ones. The two habitats differ in microclimate, but species richness, as would be predicted by the HSH, does not differ. This small scale pattern can perhaps be attributed to biogeographic processes on larger scales, as suggested by the resource synchronisation hypothesis.

Brood‐guarding duration in black‐browed albatrossesThalassarche melanophris: temporal, geographical and individual variation

In birds, the period spent brooding or guarding young chicks is highly variable, but such variation has seldom been studied. Previous single‐year studies of Antarctic petrelsThalassoica antarcticaand grey‐headed albatrossesThalassarche chrysostomarevealed a pronounced seasonal decline in brood‐guarding duration and gave rise to the ‘synchronisation hypothesis’, which suggests that some of the variation in the length of the brood‐guarding stage is related to predictable seasonal changes in the risk of chick predation. We tested the predictions of this and three other hypotheses in a two‐site, four‐year study of the black‐browed albatrossT. melanophris. The existence of a pronounced seasonal decline in brood‐guarding duration was apparent at both sites, and in years of contrasting food availability, providing further support for the ‘synchronisation hypothesis’. Alternative explanations for this pattern are that short brood‐guarding periods for late‐hatched chicks result from a seasonal decline in food availability or from the fact that early nesting birds are of higher individual quality. However, these explanations are at odds with the absence of a seasonal decline in early chick growth or in probability of chick survival. Furthermore, adult quality (measured as past reproductive performance) had a weak and inconsistent effect on the duration of brood‐guarding. Weather changes explained some of the variation in brood‐guarding, but there were no differences between regions of contrasting climates. Individual pairs displayed a degree of inter‐annual consistency in brood‐guarding duration and, at least in some years, longer brood‐guarding resulted in higher fledging probability. We speculate that a higher investment in brood‐guarding increases the cost of reproduction, which counteracts other selective pressures that would otherwise lead to longer brood‐guarding durations.

The Berger effect revised: is there indeed a structural change in the M/EEG dynamics in the transition between eyes open and eyes closed resting states?

Event Abstract Back to Event The Berger effect revised: is there indeed a structural change in the M/EEG dynamics in the transition between eyes open and eyes closed resting states? Avgis Hadjipapas1* and Erik Casagrande2 1 Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition and Behaviour, Netherlands 2 Aston University, Neural Computing Research Group, United Kingdom Eyes open and eyes closed resting states have for nearly a century now provided the prototypical contrast of rhythmic and non-rhythmic brain activity. Such phenomena have subsequently been typically quantified as band-limited power changes in multiple frequency bands and have been termed event related synchronization and desynchronization respectively, hence implicitly assuming that changes in functional topology -such as different strengths of synchronization occurring at different frequencies- of the local microscopic network underlie the observed changes in power. Although, changes in the underlying network synchronization do provide a relatively plausible explanation of the observed phenomenology -the changes in bandlimited power-, so far there was no conclusive evidence in this respect. Direct testing of a (de)synchronization hypothesis in this context becomes prohibitive due to the sheer number of required single neuron recordings. In addition extracting indirect information about synchronization in the underlying network from the macroscopic signals was not possible so far. This is because power increases in integral signals such as the M/EEG are ambiguous and can for instance be due both to an increasing number of contributing sources and an increase in coupling in the underlying network -giving rise to different synchronous patterns-. Hence, it is crucial to assess changes in local coupling in the network independent of the SNR of the macroscopic signal. Here we present a dynamical systems approach that can be applied to directly test whether the transition from rhythmic to non-rhythmic activity does in fact reflect a change in local coupling of the underlying network. The approach rests on a single assumption, namely that the coupling in the underlying network is local, so that increasing the coupling strength would favor global patterns of synchrony -resulting in a low dimensional state-, whereas low coupling would favor multiple synchronous local clusters -high dimensional state-. We employ singular spectrum decomposition to estimate the dimension of the time series derived from source reconstructed MEG data from the visual cortex of two healthy volunteers during eyes open and eyes closed resting states. We present various strategies to remove the effects of the inherently different SNR during the two states from the estimation of dimension. Preliminary results converge towards a genuine decrease in dimension at the transition from the eyes open to the eyes closed state. This change in estimated dimension signifies a structural change in the dynamics that are likely to arise from a change in functional network topology -a change from a more locally clustered toward a more globally synchronized network-. The results are discussed in the context of recent functional interpretations of alpha rhythms in relation to cortical gain. Conference: Biomag 2010 - 17th International Conference on Biomagnetism , Dubrovnik, Croatia, 28 Mar - 1 Apr, 2010. Presentation Type: Poster Presentation Topic: MEG Modeling Citation: Hadjipapas A and Casagrande E (2010). The Berger effect revised: is there indeed a structural change in the M/EEG dynamics in the transition between eyes open and eyes closed resting states?. Front. Neurosci. Conference Abstract: Biomag 2010 - 17th International Conference on Biomagnetism . doi: 10.3389/conf.fnins.2010.06.00079 Copyright: The abstracts in this collection have not been subject to any Frontiers peer review or checks, and are not endorsed by Frontiers. They are made available through the Frontiers publishing platform as a service to conference organizers and presenters. The copyright in the individual abstracts is owned by the author of each abstract or his/her employer unless otherwise stated. Each abstract, as well as the collection of abstracts, are published under a Creative Commons CC-BY 4.0 (attribution) licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) and may thus be reproduced, translated, adapted and be the subject of derivative works provided the authors and Frontiers are attributed. For Frontiers’ terms and conditions please see https://www.frontiersin.org/legal/terms-and-conditions. Received: 22 Mar 2010; Published Online: 22 Mar 2010. * Correspondence: Avgis Hadjipapas, Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition and Behaviour, Nijmegen, Netherlands, avgis.hadjipapas@donders.ru.nl Login Required This action requires you to be registered with Frontiers and logged in. To register or login click here. Abstract Info Abstract The Authors in Frontiers Avgis Hadjipapas Erik Casagrande Google Avgis Hadjipapas Erik Casagrande Google Scholar Avgis Hadjipapas Erik Casagrande PubMed Avgis Hadjipapas Erik Casagrande Related Article in Frontiers Google Scholar PubMed Abstract Close Back to top Javascript is disabled. Please enable Javascript in your browser settings in order to see all the content on this page.

Double frequency synchronization for working memory operation in the brain - a computational study for bridging human scalp EEG data and neural dynamics

Event Abstract Back to Event Double frequency synchronization for working memory operation in the brain - a computational study for bridging human scalp EEG data and neural dynamics Yoko Yamaguchi1*, David Chik1, Masahiro Kawasaki2 and Hideki Oka3 1 RIKEN BSI, Lab for Dynamics of Emergent Intelligence, Japan 2 RIKEN BTCC, Rhythm-based Brain Computation Unit, Japan 3 Osaka University, The Center for Adv Med Eng and Informatics, Japan Current studies on brain dynamics in various levels more and more reveal the dynamical brain coordinated by synchronization of oscillations. In the decade, the synchronization hypothesis for dynamical linking was extensively studied in animals and humans. Most of neural systems are known to show various oscillation frequencies in cellular levels and also during cognitive tasks in human scalp EEG. Among them, complexity of synchfonization dynamics provides fascinating problems for understanding neural mechanisms of intellectual properties. According to the dynamical system theory (e.g. the slaving principle by H Haken), slow oscillations of human EEG, such as the delta, theta and alpha can concern with higher cognitive functions to regulate local processes with fast oscillations. We hypothesize that synchronization network in each frequency band has each role in cognitive functions and that their dynamical linking among modules within the same frequency band or through cross-frequency coupling could execute the real-time computation by implementing multiple constraints for cognitive control. Recently we have reported that EEG theta rhythm related network (4~8 Hz) distributing over frontal midline regions and posterior regions is related with central executive functions (Mizuhara et al. 2007) and furthermore that the theta rhythm network emerges restrictively in manipulation period of working memory(Kawasaki et al. 2010). In the working memory task, alpha rhythm (~10 Hz) around relevant sensory regions is observed in both of storage period and operation period. interestingly, theta and alpha rhythms exhibit one to two phase-locking in the manipulation period. The network mechanism of this double frequency synchronization and its possible functional mechanism are unsolved. In this paper, we propose a alpha-theta cross frequency coupling network model for the working memory task. In the model, alpha oscillation networks are described by flip-flop oscillation networks (Colliaux et al,. 2009). A limit cycle attractor in the up state of the associative memory network represents the working memory storage. Theta network is assumed to consist of frontal midline module and sensory modality specific modules with mutual coupling. By introducing a coupling between theta and alpha rhythm units, we show theta network can regulate alpha rhythm synchronization so that dynamically linking among alpha oscillations can retrieve or manipulate memory. This is in agreement with the results suggested by Kawasaki et al. (2010). We conclude that double frequency phase locking between theta and alpha oscillations can work for cognitive control through hierarchical dynamical linking. Then, for the sake of direct comparison with our oscillation network model and human EEG scalp data, we developed a simulation system of scalp EEG by assuming electronic charge in a given location of the brain. Our programming Using InsilicoML and InsilicoDE, showed usefulness of this system on basic simulation and also suggested possible computational neuroscience approach from complex neural dynamics for understanding cognitive functions. This study was partially supported by Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research on Innovative Areas No. 4103. The simulation study is supported by physiome.jp and dynamic brain platform (DBPF).

Motivational synchronicity: Priming motivational orientations with observations of others’ behaviors

Two experiments tested the motivational synchronicity hypothesis, according to which observation of a target person’s behavior implying an intrinsic or an extrinsic motivational orientation primes the observers’ corresponding motivational orientation. Experiment 1 revealed that participants exposed to a target person intrinsically motivated to perform a task, relative to those exposed to an extrinsically motivated target person, showed greater intrinsic motivation (free-choice persistence) for the same task. Experiment 2 extended this in two important ways: (1) different tasks were used for the target and participant in order to rule out an expectation-based interpretation of the results, and (2) performance on an activity known to be facilitated by intrinsic motivation was used as the dependent measure. It appears that simply observing others’ motivational orientations influences the accessibility of the observers’ corresponding motivational orientation.

Studying Synchronization to a Musical Beat in Nonhuman Animals

The recent discovery of spontaneous synchronization to music in a nonhuman animal (the sulphur-crested cockatoo Cacatua galerita eleonora) raises several questions. How does this behavior differ from nonmusical synchronization abilities in other species, such as synchronized frog calls or firefly flashes? What significance does the behavior have for debates over the evolution of human music? What kinds of animals can synchronize to musical rhythms, and what are the key methodological issues for research in this area? This paper addresses these questions and proposes some refinements to the "vocal learning and rhythmic synchronization hypothesis."

Tutorial on New Developments in the Physics of Rotational Motions

Abstract We present a linear continuum theory incorporating asymmetric stress fields as well as symmetric strains and antisymmetric rotations. We discuss the related constitutive laws and balance equations. In this theory, the motion equation related to the balance of the antisymmetric part of stresses replaces that for the stress moments. Our theory proves that the rotation waves may exist even in a homogeneous elastic continuum. Different kinds of extreme deformations are considered. The wave solutions, including the coaction of the rotation and twist fields, are presented and discussed. The dislocation density–stress relations are derived with the help of the symmetric and antisymmetric parts of stresses. The synchronization solution, rotation, and twist, shifted in phase by π /2, are presented for a material in an advanced deformation state with granulation and microcracking. Some examples of the spin and twist motion records are reported that confirm this synchronization hypothesis.

Respiratory Circuits: Function, Mechanisms, Topology, and Pathology

Neuroscientists have long sought to understand how circuits in the nervous system are organized to generate the precise neural outputs that underlie particular behaviors. Recent studies deepened our understanding of the mechanisms responsible for the generation of the rhythmic output for breathing. Here, the author focuses on issues that are pertinent for the respiratory network and considers its organization and how it derives the functional output. The author discusses pacemaker and network mechanisms of rhythm generation, which are now combined into a novel concept of emergent network activity due to coherent excitation of pacemaker groups. He discusses subcellular basis of this hypothesis and possible mechanisms of synchronization within respiratory network. These new findings in respiratory neuroscience are further applied to explain modifications in breathing during hypoxia and possible origins of respiratory disorders that may be acquired during neural development and aging.