Hemispheric Asymmetry in TMS-Induced Effects on Spatial Attention: A Meta-Analysis.

Hemispheric asymmetry is a fundamental principle in the functional architecture of the brain. It plays an important role in attention research where right hemisphere dominance is core to many attention theories. Lesion studies seem to confirm such hemispheric dominance with patients being more likely to develop left hemineglect after right hemispheric stroke than vice versa.

Daily Sexual Behavior, Sexual Esteem, and Body Image in Transgender and Cisgender Individuals.

Multiple surveys have suggested that transgender individuals show lower sexual well-being than cisgender individuals. Most studies, however, are limited in terms of ecological validity and memory bias and cross-sectional in nature. These issues are less prevalent in diary studies monitoring responses over time at home.

Mental and sexual well-being in non-binary and genderqueer individuals.

Background: Non-binary and genderqueer (NBGQ) individuals do not identify with a binary gender identity. Some but not all NBGQ individuals identify as transgender, and it is currently unclear on which aspects of mental and sexual well-being NBGQ and binary transgender individuals may differ.

Aim: To compare NBGQ, binary transgender and cisgender individuals on variables related to mental well-being, sexual well-being, and sexual self-concept discrepancies.

Transcranial magnetic stimulation over posterior parietal cortex modulates alerting and executive control processes in attention.

Attention includes three different functional components: generating and maintaining an alert state (alerting), orienting to sensory events (orienting), and resolving conflicts between alternative actions (executive control). Neuroimaging and patient studies suggest that the posterior parietal cortex (PPC) is involved in all three attention components. Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) has repeatedly been applied over the PPC to study its functional role for shifts and maintenance of visuospatial attention.

Transcranial alternating brain stimulation at alpha frequency reduces hemispatial neglect symptoms in stroke patients.

Background/objective: Non-invasive brain stimulation techniques such as transcranial alternating current stimulation (tACS) may help alleviate attention deficits in stroke patients with hemispatial neglect by modulating oscillatory brain activity. We applied high-definition (HD)-tACS at alpha frequency over the contralesional hemisphere to support unilateral oscillatory alpha activity and correct for the pathologically altered attention bias in neglect patients.

Methods: We performed a within-subject, placebo-controlled study in which sixteen stroke patients with hemispatial neglect underwent 10 Hz (alpha) as well as sham (placebo) stimulation targeting the contralesional posterior parietal cortex.

Gender Affirming Medical Treatment Desire and Treatment Motives in Binary and Non-Binary Transgender Individuals.

Background: It is currently unknown whether there are differences in desire for gender affirming medical treatment (GAMT) between binary and non-binary transgender individuals, although the latter seek treatment less prevalently.

Aim: To investigate differences between binary and non-binary individuals on received GAMT, desire for GAMT, and motives for (not) wanting GAMT, and to explore the association between having an unfulfilled treatment desire and general and sexual well-being.

Methods: We conducted an online questionnaire in a community sample of 125 transgender men, 72 transgender women, and 62 non-binary transgender individuals (age: M = 30.

Concurrent frontal and parietal network TMS for modulating attention.

Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) has been applied to frontal eye field (FEF) and intraparietal sulcus (IPS) in isolation, to study their role in attention. However, these nodes closely interact in a "dorsal attention network". Here, we compared effects of inhibitory TMS applied to individually fMRI-localized FEF or IPS (single-node TMS), to effects of simultaneously inhibiting both regions ("network TMS"), and sham.

The Role of Continuous Theta Burst TMS in the Neurorehabilitation of Subacute Stroke Patients: A Placebo-Controlled Study.

Transcranial magnetic stimulation, in particular continuous theta burst (cTBS), has been proposed for stroke rehabilitation, based on the concept that inhibition of the healthy hemisphere helps promote the recovery of the lesioned one. We aimed to study its effects on cortical excitability, oscillatory patterns, and motor function, the main aim being to identify potentially beneficial neurophysiological effects. We applied randomized real or placebo stimulation over the unaffected primary motor cortex of 10 subacute (7 ± 3 days) post-stroke patients.

No effects of rhythmic visual stimulation on target discrimination: An online alpha entrainment experiment.

Previous research established that rhythmic sensory stimulation can affect subsequent stimulus perception, possibly through 'entrainment' of oscillations in the brain. Alpha frequency is a natural target for visual entrainment, because fluctuations in posterior alpha oscillations have been linked to visual target detection or discrimination. On the other hand, alpha oscillations also relate to attentional mechanisms, such as attentional orienting or selection.

Sexual Self-Concept Discrepancies Mediate the Relation between Gender Dysphoria Sexual Esteem and Sexual Attitudes in Binary Transgender Individuals.

Sexual responding in transgender people has typically been investigated from a medical and functional perspective. Aligning with the biopsychosocial model, it is however equally important to consider psychological aspects of sexuality in this population. We propose that the Sexual Self-Concept (SSC) theory offers a valuable framework to understand (sexual) wellbeing in transgender people, while Self-Concept Discrepancy (SCD) theory could offer an explanation of the mechanisms underlying negative SSCs related to gender dysphoria.

Top-down control of visual cortex by the frontal eye fields through oscillatory realignment.

Voluntary allocation of visual attention is controlled by top-down signals generated within the Frontal Eye Fields (FEFs) that can change the excitability of lower-level visual areas. However, the mechanism through which this control is achieved remains elusive. Here, we emulated the generation of an attentional signal using single-pulse transcranial magnetic stimulation to activate the FEFs and tracked its consequences over the visual cortex.

Phase-Coded Oscillatory Ordering Promotes the Separation of Closely Matched Representations to Optimize Perceptual Discrimination.

Low-frequency oscillations are proposed to be involved in separating neuronal representations belonging to different items. Although item-specific neuronal activity was found to cluster on different oscillatory phases, the influence of this mechanism on perception is unknown. Here, we investigated the perceptual consequences of neuronal item separation through oscillatory clustering.

Continuous theta burst stimulation increases contralateral mu and beta rhythms with arm elevation: implications for neurorehabilitation.

The study of the physiological effects underlying brain response to transcranial magnetic stimulation is important to understand its impact on neurorehabilitation. We aim to analyze the impact of a transcranial magnetic stimulation protocol, the continuous theta burst (cTBS), on human neurophysiology, particularly on contralateral motor rhythms. cTBS was applied in 20 subjects over the primary motor cortex.

Relating alpha power modulations to competing visuospatial attention theories.

Visuospatial attention theories often propose hemispheric asymmetries underlying the control of attention. In general support of these theories, previous EEG/MEG studies have shown that spatial attention is associated with hemispheric modulation of posterior alpha power (gating by inhibition). However, since measures of alpha power are typically expressed as lateralization scores, or collapsed across left and right attention shifts, the individual hemispheric contribution to the attentional control mechanism remains unclear.

No effect of cold pressor test-induced arousal on attentional benefits and costs in an endogenous spatial orienting paradigm.

Previous studies have shown that arousal can influence hemispatial bias, suggesting that changes in arousal affect the neural networks involved in spatial attention control. The goal of the present study was to measure the effects of increased arousal on endogenous attentional orienting. We used a Spatial Orienting Paradigm to quantify attentional benefits and costs as measures of attentional orienting and re-orienting responses and exposed participants (N = 25; Experiment 1) to a bilateral feet Cold Pressor Test (CPT) to manipulate arousal.

Assessing the Functional Role of Frontal Eye Fields in Voluntary and Reflexive Saccades Using Continuous Theta Burst Stimulation.

The frontal eye fields (FEFs) are core nodes of the oculomotor system contributing to saccade planning, control, and execution. Here, we aimed to reveal hemispheric asymmetries between left and right FEF in both voluntary and reflexive saccades toward horizontal and vertical targets. To this end, we applied fMRI-guided continuous theta burst stimulation (cTBS) over either left or right FEF and assessed the consequences of this disruption on saccade latencies.

Where Are the fMRI Correlates of Phosphene Perception?

Pulses of transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) over occipital cortex can induce transient visual percepts called phosphenes. Phosphenes are an interesting stimulus for the study of the human visual system, constituting conscious percepts without visual inputs, elicited by neural activation beyond retinal and subcortical processing stages in the visual hierarchy. The same TMS pulses, applied at threshold intensity phosphene threshold (PT), will prompt phosphene reports on half of all trials ("P-yes") but not on the other half ("P-no").

Hemifield-specific Correlations between Cue-related Blood Oxygen Level Dependent Activity in Bilateral Nodes of the Dorsal Attention Network and Attentional Benefits in a Spatial Orienting Paradigm.

The dorsal attention network (DAN) is known to be involved in shifts of spatial attention or in orienting. However, the involvement of each hemisphere in shifts to either hemifield is still a matter of debate. In this study, interindividual hemifield-specific attentional benefits in RTs were correlated with cue-related BOLD responses specific to directive cues in the left and right frontal and posterior nodes of the DAN, measured in a Spatial Orienting Paradigm.

Foresight beats hindsight: The neural correlates underlying motor preparation in the pro-/anti-cue paradigm.

Background: Human motor behaviors are characterized by both, reactive and proactive mechanisms. Yet, studies investigating the neural correlates of motor behavior almost exclusively focused on reactive motor processes. Here, we employed the motor preparation paradigm to systematically study proactive motor control in an imaging environment.

Moving Beyond Attentional Biases: Shifting the Interhemispheric Balance between Left and Right Posterior Parietal Cortex Modulates Attentional Control Processes.

The concept of interhemispheric competition has been very influential in attention research, and the occurrence of biased attention due to an imbalance in posterior parietal cortex (PPC) is well documented. In this context, the vast majority of studies have assessed attentional performance with tasks that did not include an explicit experimental manipulation of attention, and, as a consequence, it remains largely unknown how these findings relate to core attentional constructs such as endogenous and exogenous control and spatial orienting and reorienting. We here addressed this open question by creating an imbalance between left and right PPC with transcranial direct current stimulation, resulting in right-hemispheric dominance, and assessed performance on three experimental paradigms that isolate distinct attentional processes.

Horizontal tuning for faces originates in high-level Fusiform Face Area.

Recent work indicates that the specialization of face visual perception relies on the privileged processing of horizontal angles of facial information. This suggests that stimulus properties assumed to be fully resolved in primary visual cortex (V1; e.g.

Rethinking the role of sham TMS.

Sham transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) approaches are widely used in basic and clinical research to ensure that observed effects are due to the intended neural manipulation instead of being caused by various possible side effects. We here critically discuss several methodological aspects of sham TMS. Importantly, we propose to carefully distinguish between the placebo versus sensory side effects of TMS.