Physiological activation fluctuates throughout the day. Previous studies have shown that during periods of reduced activation, cognitive control remains resilient due to neural compensatory mechanisms. In this study, we investigate the effects of high physiological activation on both behavioural and neural markers of cognitive control.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIntolerance of Uncertainty (IU) is thought to lead to maladaptive behaviours and dysfunctional decision making, both in the clinical and healthy population. The seminal study reported by Luhmann and collaborators in 2011 showed that IU was negatively associated with choosing a delayed, but more certain and valuable, reward over choosing an immediate, but less certain and valuable, reward. These findings have been widely disseminated across the field of personality and individual differences because of their relevance to understand the role of IU in maladaptive behaviours in anxiety-related disorders.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThroughout the day, humans show natural fluctuations in arousal that impact cognitive function. To study the behavioural dynamics of cognitive control during high and low arousal states, healthy participants performed an auditory conflict task during high-intensity physical exercise (N = 39) or drowsiness (N = 33). In line with the pre-registered hypotheses, conflict and conflict adaptation effects were preserved during both altered arousal states.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFSelective attention is a cognitive function that helps filter out unwanted information. Theories such as the biased competition model (Desimone & Duncan, 1995) explain how attentional templates bias processing towards targets in contexts where multiple stimuli compete for resources. However, it is unclear how the anticipation of different levels of competition influences the nature of attentional templates, in a proactive fashion.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFExtensive research links regular physical exercise to an overall enhancement of cognitive function across the lifespan. Here we assess the causal evidence supporting this relationship in the healthy population, using an umbrella review of meta-analyses limited to randomized controlled trials (RCTs). Despite most of the 24 reviewed meta-analyses reporting a positive overall effect, our assessment reveals evidence of low statistical power in the primary RCTs, selective inclusion of studies, publication bias and large variation in combinations of pre-processing and analytic decisions.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Flow state is a subjective experience that people report when task performance is experienced as automatic, intrinsically rewarding, optimal and effortless. While this intriguing phenomenon is the subject of a plethora of behavioural studies, only recently researchers have started to look at its neural correlates. Here, we aim to systematically and critically review the existing literature on the neural correlates of the flow state.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe current paradigm in brain research focuses on individual brain rhythms, their spatiotemporal organization, and specific pairwise interactions in association with physiological states, cognitive functions, and pathological conditions. Here we propose a conceptually different approach to understanding physiologic function as emerging behavior from communications among distinct brain rhythms. We hypothesize that all brain rhythms coordinate as a network to generate states and facilitate functions.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIntolerance of Uncertainty (IU) is thought to lead to maladaptive behaviours and dysfunctional decision making, both in the clinical and healthy population. The seminal study reported by Luhmann and collaborators in 2011 [1] showed that IU was negatively associated with choosing a delayed, but more probable and valuable, reward over choosing an immediate, but less probable and valuable, reward. These findings have been widely disseminated across the field of personality and individual differences because of their relevance for the understanding of the role of IU in the development and maintenance of anxiety-related disorders.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFHumans are uniquely capable of adapting to highly changing environments by updating relevant information and adjusting ongoing behaviour accordingly. Here we show how this ability -termed cognitive flexibility- is differentially modulated by high and low arousal fluctuations. We implemented a probabilistic reversal learning paradigm in healthy participants as they transitioned towards sleep or physical extenuation.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFNeurosci Biobehav Rev
September 2021
Habit-like eating behavior is repeatedly pointed to as a key cognitive mechanism contributing to the emergence and maintenance of obesity. Here, we conducted a systematic review of the literature to assess the existent behavioral evidence for the Habit Hypothesis for Overeating (HHO) which states that obesity is the consequence of an imbalance between the habit and goal-directed reward learning systems, leading to overconsumption of food. We found a total of 19 studies implementing a variety of experimental protocols (i.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe use of tramadol is a controversial topic in cycling. In order to provide novel evidence on this issue, we tested 29 participants in a pre-loaded cycling time trial (TT; a 20-min TT preceded by 40-min of constant work-rate at 60% of the VO) after ingesting 100 mg of tramadol (vs placebo and paracetamol (1.5 g)).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFCardiovascular fitness has repeatedly been associated to enhanced cognitive and brain functioning, generally in the form of differences in reaction time and response accuracy, as well as in event-related potentials (ERPs) and blood-oxygen-level-dependent imaging while participants performed executive demanding tasks. However, the evidence regarding potential differences in oscillatory neural activity, an inherent characteristic of brain functioning, is scarce. To fill this gap, here, we extracted and analysed (using a data-driven exploratory approach) brain oscillatory activity, both tonic (overall electroencephalographic - EEG - oscillatory activity) and transient (event related spectral perturbation [ERSP] and inter-trial coherence [ITC]), from a previous published dataset (Luque-Casado et al.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFSince emotions and regulatory control are relevant for decision-making, their circadian fluctuation should influence the outcome of such decisions, but this question has been rarely addressed. A review of the literature suggests that the evidence regarding circadian synchrony effects (better performance at optimal vs. non-optimal times of day according to chronotype) on decision-making is mixed, likely due to the use of different approaches to estimate chronotype.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFA substantial body of work has depicted a positive association between physical exercise and cognition, although the key factors driving that link are still a matter of scientific debate. Here, we aimed to contribute further to that topic by pooling the data from seven studies ( = 361) conducted by our research group to examine whether cardiovascular fitness (VO), sport type participation (externally-paced (e.g.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjectives: To test the hypothesis that transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) over the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) influences performance in a 20-min time-trial self-paced exercise and electroencephalographic (EEG) oscillatory brain activity in a group of trained male cyclists.
Design: The study consisted of a pre-registered (https://osf.io/rf95j/), randomised, sham-controlled, single-blind, within-subject design experiment.
Intense physical exercise exerts measurable changes at various physiological levels that are well documented in the literature. However, despite the key role of the brain in processing inputs from internal organ systems and the external environment to coordinate and optimize behavior, little is known about brain dynamics during exercise. The present study investigates tonic and transient oscillatory brain activity in a group of participants performing an oddball task during a single bout of aerobic exercise.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFExtant evidence suggests that acute exercise triggers a tonic power increase in the alpha frequency band at frontal locations, which has been linked to benefits in cognitive function. However, recent literature has questioned such a selective effect on a particular frequency band, indicating a rather overall power increase across the entire frequency spectrum. Moreover, the nature of task-evoked oscillatory brain activity associated to inhibitory control after exercising, and the duration of the exercise effect, are not yet clear.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: A growing set of studies has shown a positive relationship between aerobic fitness and a broad array of cognitive functions. However, few studies have focused on sustained attention, which has been considered a fundamental cognitive process that underlies most everyday activities. The purpose of this study was to investigate the role of aerobic fitness as a key factor in sustained attention capacities in young adults.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMaintaining vigilance over long periods of time is especially critical in performing fundamental everyday activities and highly responsible professional tasks (e.g., driving, performing surgery or piloting).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFJ Behav Ther Exp Psychiatry
September 2015
Objetives: Despite the increasing interest in mindfulness, the basic components and action mechanisms of mindfulness remain controversial. The present study aims at testing the specific contribution of two components of mindfulness -attention to cognitive experience (metacognition) and awareness of interoceptive sensations (metainteroception)- in the treatment of chronic worry.
Method: Forty five female university students with high scores in the Penn State Worry Questionnaire were split into three groups: a mindfulness cognitive training group, a mindfulness interoceptive training group, and a non-intervention control group.
Affective facial expressions are potent social cues that can induce relevant physiological changes, as well as behavioral dispositions in the observer. Previous studies have revealed that angry faces induced significant reductions in body sway as compared with neutral and happy faces, reflecting an avoidance behavioral tendency as freezing. The expression of pain is usually considered an unpleasant stimulus, but also a relevant cue for delivering effective care and social support.
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