Visual Cue Conditions Research Articles

Auditory N1 and P2 attenuation in action observation: An event-related potential study considering effects of temporal predictability and individualism

Tones that are generated by self-performed actions elicit attenuated N1 and P2 amplitudes, as measured by electroencephalography (EEG), compared to identical external tones, which is referred to as neurophysiological sensory attenuation (SA). At the same time, self-generated tones are perceived as less loud compared to external tones (perceptual SA). Action observation led in part to a similar neurophysiological and perceptual SA. The perceptual SA in observers was found in comparison to tones that were temporally predictable, and one study suggested that perceptual SA in observers might depend on the cultural dimension of individualism. In this study, we examined neurophysiological SA for tones elicited by self-performed and observed actions during simultaneous EEG acquisitions in two participants, extending the paradigm with a visual cue condition controlling for effects of temporal predictability. Moreover, we investigated the effect of individualism on neurophysiological SA in action observation. Relative to un-cued external tones, the N1 was only descriptively reduced for tones that were elicited by self-performed or observed actions and significantly attenuated for cued external tones. A P2 attenuation effect relative to un-cued external tones was found in all three conditions, with stronger effects for self- and other-generated tones than for cued external tones. We found no evidence for an effect of individualism. These findings add to previous evidence for neurophysiological SA in action performance and observation with a paradigm well-controlled for the effect of predictability and individualism, showing differential effects of the former on the N1 and P2 components, and no effect of the latter.

Perception of Self-Moving Speed in Different Visual Cue and Viewpoint Conditions in Virtual Reality Environment

Perception of Self-Moving Speed in Different Visual Cue and Viewpoint Conditions in Virtual Reality Environment

The effects of visual cues from optical stimulation devices on gait disturbance in patients with Parkinson's disease.

[Purpose] The purpose of this study was to identify the optimal visual cues for gait disturbance in patients with Parkinson's disease based on the luminous duration and the individual patient preferences for a wearable visual cue device. [Participants and Methods] Twenty-four patients with Parkinson's disease walked while wearing only a visual cue device in the control condition. They then walked while the device was set to two stimulus conditions: the luminous duration at 10% and 50% of the individual gait cycle. After walking under the two stimulus conditions, the patients were asked for their preferred visual cue condition. The walking results were compared between the two stimulus conditions and the control condition. Gait parameters were compared among the three conditions. The comparisons with preference, non-preference, and control conditions were also made for the same gait parameter. [Results] When compared to the control condition, walking with visual cues in the stimulus conditions reduced stride duration and increased cadence. The preference and non-preference conditions had shorter stride durations than the control condition. Furthermore, the preference condition also resulted in a faster gait speed than the non-preference condition. [Conclusion] This study suggests that a wearable visual cue device with the patient's preferred luminous duration may help manage gait disturbance in patients with Parkinson's disease.

The contribution of visual and linguistic cues to the production of passives in ADHD and DLD: evidence from thematic priming

ABSTRACT This study investigated how thematic priming via visual and linguistic cues influences the choice of syntactic voice in healthy French-speaking adults and in French-speaking children with typical and atypical development. In particular, we focused on children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and developmental language disorder (DLD), two clinical groups with documented syntactic difficulties. Twenty adults (M= 24;7) and 60 children aged 6–11 (20 typically developing, 20 with DLD and 20 with ADHD) were presented with agent or patient cues that progressively increased in strength over three conditions: a no cue condition, a visual cue condition with two cue types (perceptual vs. referential) and a linguistic cue condition with two cue types (topicalization of the agent/patient with and without subsequent sentence initiation). Results showed that all participants produced more passives after having been presented with a patient cue, regardless of cue type (cue > no cue), but linguistic cues facilitated the production of passives significantly more than visual cues (linguistic cue > visual cue). We also found that children with DLD were more sensitive than children with ADHD to visual cues (DLD > ADHD), which were more implicit than the linguistic cues and may have required more attentional resources. The opposite pattern (ADHD > DLD) was true for the linguistic cues, which required syntactic processing. These findings highlight how the development of dynamic tools using cue modality and cue sensitivity might be useful for discriminating children with and without syntactic impairment.

Exogenous Bimodal Cues Attenuate Age-Related Audiovisual Integration.

Previous studies have demonstrated that exogenous attention decreases audiovisual integration (AVI); however, whether the AVI is different when exogenous attention is elicited by bimodal and unimodal cues and its aging effect remain unclear. To clarify this matter, 20 older adults and 20 younger adults were recruited to conduct an auditory/visual discrimination task following bimodal audiovisual cues or unimodal auditory/visual cues. The results showed that the response to all stimulus types was faster in younger adults compared with older adults, and the response was faster when responding to audiovisual stimuli compared with auditory or visual stimuli. Analysis using the race model revealed that the AVI was lower in the exogenous-cue conditions compared with the no-cue condition for both older and younger adults. The AVI was observed in all exogenous-cue conditions for the younger adults (visual cue > auditory cue > audiovisual cue); however, for older adults, the AVI was only found in the visual-cue condition. In addition, the AVI was lower in older adults compared to younger adults under no- and visual-cue conditions. These results suggested that exogenous attention decreased the AVI, and the AVI was lower in exogenous attention elicited by bimodal-cue than by unimodal-cue conditions. In addition, the AVI was reduced for older adults compared with younger adults under exogenous attention.

Continuous Skin-Stretch Feedback for Rendering 3D Vector Information

Most of the previous haptic interfaces provides tactile feedback directly to the hand, which can impede the operability. Noting the issue, we propose a haptic system that can provide 3D vector information with continuous skin-stretch feedback. We designed the system to render a 3D vector by combining two orthogonally located continuous skin-stretch modules whose orientation could be controlled. To optimize the stimuli, we conducted a psychophysical experiment that measured human sensitivity to the orientation of the continuous skin-stretch feedback. Considering the asymmetry of tactile sensitivity, we collected the data at two locations of the forearm. The results indicate that the participants were more sensitive to the angle change when the skin-stretch feedback was aligned in the proximal-distal direction. Based on the information, we built an algorithm to set the rotation angle of the skin-stretch module to render any target 3D vector. We conducted two experiments for virtual interaction to evaluate our proposed method. In Experiment 1, we tested if adjusting the skin-stretch orientation could improve the human perception of the virtual surface features, and the result indicated a significant improvement in the surface feature perception with the orientation adjustment. Experiment 2 tested a participant's ability to follow a random 3D contour under two conditions, visual cue (V) condition, and visual and continuous skin-stretch (V+CF) cues condition. For the V+CF condition, the skin-stretch interface rendered the error 3D vector to the participant's forearm. The result indicated a significantly lower root-mean-square error for the V+CF condition than the V condition. Thus, the addition of the continuous skin-stretch feedback benefitted the participants to stay closer to the target virtual contour than with visual information only.

Effects of Visual Predictive Information and Sequential Context on Neural Processing of Musical Syntax.

The early right anterior negativity (ERAN) in event-related potentials (ERPs) is typically elicited by syntactically unexpected events in Western tonal music. We examined how visual predictive information influences syntactic processing, how musical or non-musical cues have different effects, and how they interact with sequential effects between trials, which could modulate with the strength of the sense of established tonality. The EEG was recorded from musicians who listened to chord sequences paired with one of four types of visual stimuli; two provided predictive information about the syntactic validity of the last chord through either musical notation of the whole sequence, or the word “regular” or “irregular,” while the other two, empty musical staves or a blank screen, provided no information. Half of the sequences ended with the syntactically invalid Neapolitan sixth chord, while the other half ended with the Tonic chord. Clear ERAN was observed in frontocentral electrodes in all conditions. A principal component analysis (PCA) was performed on the grand average response in the audio-only condition, to separate spatio-temporal dynamics of different scalp areas as principal components (PCs) and use them to extract auditory-related neural activities in the other visual-cue conditions. The first principal component (PC1) showed a symmetrical frontocentral topography, while the second (PC2) showed a right-lateralized frontal concentration. A source analysis confirmed the relative contribution of temporal sources to the former and a right frontal source to the latter. Cue predictability affected only the ERAN projected onto PC1, especially when the previous trial ended with the Tonic chord. The ERAN in PC2 was reduced in the trials following Neapolitan endings in general. However, the extent of this reduction differed between cue-styles, whereby it was nearly absent when musical notation was used, regardless of whether the staves were filled with notes or empty. The results suggest that the right frontal areas carry out the primary role in musical syntactic analysis and integration of the ongoing context, which produce schematic expectations that, together with the veridical expectation incorporated by the temporal areas, inform musical syntactic processing in musicians.

Virtual Footprints Can Improve Walking Performance in People With Parkinson's Disease.

In Parkinson's disease (PD) self-directed movement, such as walking, is often found to be impaired while goal directed movement, such as catching a ball, stays relatively unaltered. This dichotomy is most clearly observed when sensory cueing techniques are used to deliver patterns of sound and/or light which in turn act as an external guide that improves gait performance. In this study we developed visual cues that could be presented in an immersive, interactive virtual reality (VR) environment. By controlling how the visual cues (black footprints) were presented, we created different forms of spatial and temporal information. By presenting the black footprints at a pre-specified distance apart we could recreate different step lengths (spatial cues) and by controlling when the black footprints changed color to red, we could convey information about the timing of the foot placement (temporal cues). A group of healthy controls (HC; N = 10) and a group of idiopathic PD patients (PD, N = 12) were asked to walk using visual cues that were tailored to their own gait performance [two spatial conditions (115% [N] and 130% [L] of an individual's baseline step length) and three different temporal conditions (spatial only condition [NT], 100 and 125% baseline step cadence)]. Both groups were found to be able to match their gait performance (step length and step cadence) to the information presented in all the visual cue conditions apart from the 125% step cadence conditions. In all conditions the PD group showed reduced levels of gait variability (p < 0.05) while the HC group did not decrease. For step velocity there was a significant increase in the temporal conditions, the spatial conditions and of the interaction between the two for both groups of participants (p < 0.05). The coefficient of variation of step length, cadence, and velocity were all significantly reduced for the PD group compared to the HC group. In conclusion, our results show how virtual footsteps presented in an immersive, interactive VR environment can significantly improve gait performance in participants with Parkinson's disease.

Auditory prediction during speaking and listening

In the present EEG study, the role of auditory prediction in speech was explored through the comparison of auditory cortical responses during active speaking and passive listening to the same acoustic speech signals. Two manipulations of sensory prediction accuracy were used during the speaking task: (1) a real-time change in vowel F1 feedback (reducing prediction accuracy relative to unaltered feedback) and (2) presenting a stable auditory target rather than a visual cue to speak (enhancing auditory prediction accuracy during baseline productions, and potentially enhancing the perturbing effect of altered feedback). While subjects compensated for the F1 manipulation, no difference between the auditory-cue and visual-cue conditions were found. Under visually-cued conditions, reduced N1/P2 amplitude was observed during speaking vs. listening, reflecting a motor-to-sensory prediction. In addition, a significant correlation was observed between the magnitude of behavioral compensatory F1 response and the magnitude of this speaking induced suppression (SIS) for P2 during the altered auditory feedback phase, where a stronger compensatory decrease in F1 was associated with a stronger the SIS effect. Finally, under the auditory-cued condition, an auditory repetition-suppression effect was observed in N1/P2 amplitude during the listening task but not active speaking, suggesting that auditory predictive processes during speaking and passive listening are functionally distinct.

Tiger salamanders' (Ambystoma tigrinum) response learning and usage of visual cues.

We explored tiger salamanders' (Ambystoma tigrinum) learning to execute a response within a maze as proximal visual cue conditions varied. In Experiment 1, salamanders learned to turn consistently in a T-maze for reinforcement before the maze was rotated. All learned the initial task and executed the trained turn during test, suggesting that they learned to demonstrate the reinforced response during training and continued to perform it during test. In a second experiment utilizing a similar procedure, two visual cues were placed consistently at the maze junction. Salamanders were reinforced for turning towards one cue. Cue placement was reversed during test. All learned the initial task, but executed the trained turn rather than turning towards the visual cue during test, evidencing response learning. In Experiment 3, we investigated whether a compound visual cue could control salamanders' behaviour when it was the only cue predictive of reinforcement in a cross-maze by varying start position and cue placement. All learned to turn in the direction indicated by the compound visual cue, indicating that visual cues can come to control their behaviour. Following training, testing revealed that salamanders attended to stimuli foreground over background features. Overall, these results suggest that salamanders learn to execute responses over learning to use visual cues but can use visual cues if required. Our success with this paradigm offers the potential in future studies to explore salamanders' cognition further, as well as to shed light on how features of the tiger salamanders' life history (e.g. hibernation and metamorphosis) impact cognition.

Brain networks engaged in audiovisual integration during speech perception revealed by persistent homology-based network filtration.

The human brain naturally integrates audiovisual information to improve speech perception. However, in noisy environments, understanding speech is difficult and may require much effort. Although the brain network is supposed to be engaged in speech perception, it is unclear how speech-related brain regions are connected during natural bimodal audiovisual or unimodal speech perception with counterpart irrelevant noise. To investigate the topological changes of speech-related brain networks at all possible thresholds, we used a persistent homological framework through hierarchical clustering, such as single linkage distance, to analyze the connected component of the functional network during speech perception using functional magnetic resonance imaging. For speech perception, bimodal (audio-visual speech cue) or unimodal speech cues with counterpart irrelevant noise (auditory white-noise or visual gum-chewing) were delivered to 15 subjects. In terms of positive relationship, similar connected components were observed in bimodal and unimodal speech conditions during filtration. However, during speech perception by congruent audiovisual stimuli, the tighter couplings of left anterior temporal gyrus-anterior insula component and right premotor-visual components were observed than auditory or visual speech cue conditions, respectively. Interestingly, visual speech is perceived under white noise by tight negative coupling in the left inferior frontal region-right anterior cingulate, left anterior insula, and bilateral visual regions, including right middle temporal gyrus, right fusiform components. In conclusion, the speech brain network is tightly positively or negatively connected, and can reflect efficient or effortful processes during natural audiovisual integration or lip-reading, respectively, in speech perception.

Kinematic analysis of arm and trunk movements in the gait of Parkinson's disease patients based on external signals.

[Purpose] To investigate the role of external cues on arm swing amplitude and trunk rotation in Parkinson’s disease. [Subjects and Methods] The subjects were 13 elderly patients with Parkinson’s disease. Subjects walked under four different conditions in a random order: no cue, visual cue, auditory cue, and combined cue. The auditory cue velocity consisted of a metronome beat 20% greater than the subject’s general gait speed. For the visual cue condition, bright yellow colored strips of tape placed on the floor at intervals equal to 40% of each subject’s height. A motion analysis system was used to measure arm swing amplitude and trunk rotation during walking. [Results] There was a significant difference in the kinematic variables (arm swing amplitude) between different cues, but there was not a significant difference in the kinematic variables with respect to the trunk rotation. [Conclusion] The findings of this study indicate that patients with Parkinson’s disease are likely to focus attention on auditory cues. The measurement of arm and trunk kinematics during gait by auditory cues can increase the available methods for the analysis of complex motor programs in movement disorders.

Objects and landmarks: hippocampal place cells respond differently to manipulations of visual cues depending on size, perspective, and experience.

Human navigation studies show that landmarks are used for orientation, whereas objects contribute to the contextual representation of an environment. What constitutes a landmark? Classic rodent studies show that hippocampal place fields are controlled by distal, polarizing cues. Place fields, however, are also influenced by local cues. One difficulty in examining mechanisms by which distal and local cues influence the activity of hippocampal cells is that distant cues are necessarily processed visually, whereas local cues are generally multimodal. Here, we compared the effects of 90° rotations under different cue conditions in which cues were restricted to the visual modality. Three two-dimensional visual cue conditions were presented in a square open field: a large vertical cue on one wall, a large floor cue in a corner abutting two walls, and a smaller complex floor cue in a corner adjacent to two walls. We show that rotations of large distal cues, whether on the wall or floor, were equally effective in controlling place fields. Rotations of the smaller floor cues were significantly more likely to result in remapping, whether or not animals were also exposed to the distal polarizing cues. Responses of distal and local cues were affected differently by extended experience. Our data provide evidence that hippocampal place cell responses to visual cues are influenced by perspective, salience of the cue, and prior experience. The hippocampus processes visual cues either as stable landmarks useful for orientation and navigation or as nonstationary objects or features of the local environment available for associative learning or binding items in context.

Model Comparison in Group Decision Making

In some studies based on social identity perspectives, identification with others and conformity to a majority opinion have been indisputable outcomes when individuals involved all look alike. In contrast, another group of studies suggests individuals in a visually deindividuated condition are reluctant to agree with a majority opinion. To investigate such inconsistency, we set up and tested a hypothesized model that compares two processes that provide competing predictions about the effect of uniform visual cue on conformity: the social identification process derived from the social identity model of deindividuation effects (SIDE) and the compensatory nonconformity process derived from optimal distinctiveness theory (ODT). We also investigate how changes in the visual cue conditions affect those two processes. Implications are discussed regarding the comparison of two models and the investigation of conditions under which either process is more or less operant during group interaction.

External cues benefit walking ability of ambulatory patients with spinal cord injury

Background/objectivesSensorimotor dysfunction following spinal cord injury (SCI) reduces ability of the patients to perceive information and control movements. They may need alternative sources of input to optimize their walking ability. This study investigated effects of external cues on walking ability in 33 independent ambulatory participants with SCI.MethodsParticipants’ walking ability was cross-sectionally assessed under three conditions including self-determined fastest walking speed (uncued condition), and fastest walking speed with the use of external cues (visual cue and visuotemporal cue conditions). Walking ability was measured in terms of walking speed, stride length, cadence, and percent step symmetry. Findings of the three conditions were compared using the one-way analysis of variance with repeated measures.ResultsWhen using external cues particularly the visuotemporal cue, participants showed a significant increase in walking speed, stride length, and cadence as compared with those of the uncued condition (P < 0.005). The increment of walking speed was demonstrated even in participants at a chronic stage of injury (post-injury time ≥12 months), with severe SCI (American Spinal Injury Association Impairment Scale C), or who required a walking device.ConclusionThe results suggested the benefit of external cues, particularly the visuotemporal cues, as a potential rehabilitation tool to improve walking speed of individuals with SCI.

Motor planning in preschool children – the use of a visual cue to test the end-state comfort effect: a preliminary study

The end-state comfort effect has been observed in grip selections of adult humans and other species of primates, but few studies have explored this effect in young children. The present study investigated the effect of a visual cue on the sensitivity to exhibit end-state comfort. Preschool children (N = 17) completed the task of picking up an overturned cup, turning it right-side up, and pouring water into it. Each child performed three trials of this task in both visual cue and non-visual cue conditions. Results revealed no significant difference between the two visual cue conditions in using a thumb-down or end-state comfort grip, χ 2 (1) = 0.12, p > 0.05. The findings offer practical implications regarding young children's ability to plan movement along with the potential role of early learning centres in creating environments that promote motor planning.

Cognitive Therapy Abilities in People with Learning Disabilities

Background There is a need to develop and adapt therapies for use with people with learning disabilities who have mental health problems.Aims To examine the performance of people with learning disabilities on two cognitive therapy tasks (emotion recognition and discrimination among thoughts, feelings and behaviours). We hypothesized that cognitive therapy task performance would be significantly correlated with IQ and receptive vocabulary, and that providing a visual cue would improve performance.Method Fifty‐nine people with learning disabilities were assessed on the Wechsler Abbreviated Scale of Intelligence (WASI), the British Picture Vocabulary Scale‐II (BPVS‐II), a test of emotion recognition and a task requiring participants to discriminate among thoughts, feelings and behaviours. In the discrimination task, participants were randomly assigned to a visual cue condition or a no‐cue condition.Results There was considerable variability in performance. Emotion recognition was significantly associated with receptive vocabulary, and discriminating among thoughts, feelings and behaviours was significantly associated with vocabulary and IQ. There was no effect of the cue on the discrimination task.Conclusion People with learning disabilities with higher IQs and good receptive vocabulary were more likely to be able to identify different emotions and to discriminate among thoughts, feelings and behaviours. This implies that they may more easily understand the cognitive model. Structured ways of simplifying the concepts used in cognitive therapy and methods of socialization and education in the cognitive model are required to aid participation of people with learning disabilities.

Effects of visual and auditory cues on gait initiation in people with Parkinson's disease

Objective: To evaluate the effects of auditory and visual cues on gait initiation in people with Parkinson's disease. Subjects: Fourteen subjects with Parkinson's disease were recruited from community support groups, seven of whom reported having experienced freezing when walking. Design and setting: This study was a repeated measures analysis of gait initiation performance during a single visit to a university-based motion laboratory. Following baseline trials, auditory and visual cue conditions were presented in random order. The auditory cues were rhythmic sounds with an interval matching the subject's average step time. The visual cues were high-contrast transverse lines on the floor adjusted for the subject's first step length and overall height. Main measures: Kinematic recordings enabled calculation of the timing and length of steps as well as overall velocity. The timing and magnitude of weight shift and push-off force were obtained from a force platform. Results: The magnitudes of first and second step lengths, of push-off force and of overall gait velocity were significantly greater in the visual cue condition than in the baseline condition, whereas there was no significant effect of auditory cue on these measures. Neither cue had any significant effect on the timing of key events in gait initiation. Conclusions: Transverse line visual cues enable people with Parkinson's disease to begin walking with longer steps, greater push-off force and higher velocity. Auditory cues that others have shown to improve aspects of gait in people with Parkinson's disease do not appear to have any systematic effect on the first two steps of gait initiation.

Effects of injections of glucose into the dorsal striatum on learning of place and response mazes

The present experiment tested the hypothesis that facilitation of striatal function with intra-striatal glucose injections would facilitate learning a striatum-dependent response maze and impair learning a hippocampus-dependent place maze. Food-deprived Sprague–Dawley male rats were trained to find food in a Y-maze. In the place version of the maze, rats were rewarded for learning to go to an arm located in a fixed location while in the response task rats were rewarded for consistently turning in the same direction at the choice point. Artificial cerebrospinal fluid (1 μL) containing either 0.7 nmol of glucose (control) or 20 nmol of glucose was injected bilaterally into the dorsal striatum immediately before training. The animals were trained to a criterion of 9/10 correct choices. In the place maze, glucose injections impaired learning, as measured by number of trials required to reach 9/10 correct. However, in the response task, glucose injections did not enhance learning. A subsequent experiment examined the effects of intra-striatal glucose injections on acquisition of the response task under two different visual cue conditions, addition of an intra-maze light cue that predicted the correct arm or with removal of most visual extramaze cues. Glucose again failed to facilitate acquisition of the response task under these conditions. These findings suggest that facilitation of striatal function via intra-striatal glucose injections is sufficient to impair place learning but not to enhance response learning, perhaps separating the neurochemical mechanisms for striatal involvement in impairment of place and enhancement of response learning.

Impaired Visual Attention in Children with Dyslexia

Reading involves the correct and rapid identification of visual stimuli with letters and words. The processing of visual stimuli depends not only on the integrity of the peripheral and central visual system but also on the attentional systems involved. In the present study, a cue-target visual attention task was administered to a population-based sample of 25 children with dyslexia from 10 to 12 years of age. A control group matched for group size, age, and gender was obtained from the same general population. A two-stage screening process involved a spelling task of regular words followed by a battery of five single-word reading tasks. The cue-target task involved both a computer-controlled stimulus presentation and a computer-controlled measurement of reaction time. The data were analyzed by visual field, cue condition (valid, invalid, and no cue), and cue-target interval (CTI). The results showed a general pattern of slower responses in the dyslexia group compared to the control group. The dyslexia group also had longer reaction times in the short CTI condition (covert shift of attention) and in the long CTI condition (overt shift of attention). The findings may reflect a general attentional deficit to visual stimuli in dyslexia, possibly related to problems with the recruitment of necessary cognitive resources for the performance of complex reaction time tasks and for fluent reading.