Quantum Mechanics of 'Conscious Energy'

This paper is aiming to investigate the physical substrate of conscious process. It will attempt to find out: How does conscious process establish relations between their external stimuli and internal stimuli in order to create reality? How does consciousness devoid of new sensory input result to its new quantum effects? And how does conscious process gain mass in brain? This paper will also try to locate the origins of consciousness at the level of neurons along with the quantum effects of conscious process

Executive "brake failure" following deactivation of human frontal lobe

In the course of daily living, humans frequently encounter situations in which a motor activity, once initiated, becomes unnecessary or inappropriate. Under such circumstances, the ability to inhibit motor responses can be of vital importance. Although the nature of response inhibition has been studied in psychology for several decades, its neural basis remains unclear. Using transcranial magnetic stimulation, we found that temporary deactivation of the pars opercularis in the right inferior frontal gyrus selectively impairs the ability to stop an initiated action. Critically, deactivation of the same region did not affect the ability to execute responses, nor did it influence physiological arousal. These findings confirm and extend recent reports that the inferior frontal gyrus is vital for mediating response inhibition

The Flexible Nature of Unconscious Cognition

The cognitive signature of unconscious processes is hotly debated recently. Generally, consciousness is thought to mediate flexible, adaptive and goal-directed behavior, but in the last decade unconscious processing has rapidly gained ground on traditional conscious territory. In this study we demonstrate that the scope and impact of unconscious information on behavior and brain activity can be modulated dynamically on a trial-by-trial basis. Participants performed a Go/No-Go experiment in which an unconscious (masked) stimulus preceding a conscious target could be associated with either a Go or No-Go response. Importantly, the mapping of stimuli onto these actions varied on a trial-by-trial basis, preventing the formation of stable associations and hence the possibility that unconscious stimuli automatically activate these control actions. By eliminating stimulus-response associations established through practice we demonstrate that unconscious information can be processed in a flexible and adaptive manner. In this experiment we show that the same unconscious stimulus can have a substantially different effect on behavior and (prefrontal) brain activity depending on the rapidly changing task context in which it is presented. This work suggests that unconscious information processing shares many sophisticated characteristics (including flexibility and context-specificity) with its conscious counterpart

Event-Related Potential Correlates of Performance-Monitoring in a Lateralized Time-Estimation Task

Performance-monitoring as a key function of cognitive control covers a wide range of diverse processes to enable goal directed behavior and to avoid maladjustments. Several event-related brain potentials (ERP) are associated with performance-monitoring, but their conceptual background differs. For example, the feedback-related negativity (FRN) is associated with unexpected performance feedback and might serve as a teaching signal for adaptational processes, whereas the error-related negativity (ERN) is associated with error commission and subsequent behavioral adaptation. The N2 is visible in the EEG when the participant successfully inhibits a response following a cue and thereby adapts to a given stop-signal. Here, we present an innovative paradigm to concurrently study these different performance-monitoring-related ERPs. In 24 participants a tactile time-estimation task interspersed with infrequent stop-signal trials reliably elicited all three ERPs. Sensory input and motor output were completely lateralized, in order to estimate any hemispheric processing preferences for the different aspects of performance monitoring associated with these ERPs. In accordance with the literature our data suggest augmented inhibitory capabilities in the right hemisphere given that stop-trial performance was significantly better with left- as compared to right-hand stop-signals. In line with this, the N2 scalp distribution was generally shifted to the right in addition to an ipsilateral shift in relation to the response hand. Other than that, task lateralization affected neither behavior related to error and feedback processing nor ERN or FRN. Comparing the ERP topographies using the Global Map Dissimilarity index, a large topographic overlap was found between all considered components.With an evenly distributed set of trials and a split-half reliability for all ERP components ≥.85 the task is well suited to efficiently study N2, ERN, and FRN concurrently which might prove useful for group comparisons, especially in clinical populations

Neuropsychological parameters indexing executive processes are associated with independent components of ERPs

AbstractLesion studies have indicated that at least the three executive processes can be differentiated in the frontal lobe: Energization, monitoring and task setting. Event related potentials (ERPs) in Go/NoGo tasks have been widely used in studying executive processes. In this study, ERPs were obtained from EEG recorded during performance of a cued Go/NoGo task. The Contingent Negative Variation (CNV) and P3NoGo waves were decomposed into four independent components (ICs), by applying Independent Component Analysis (ICA) to a collection of ERPs from 193 healthy individuals. The components were named IC CNVearly, IC CNVlate, IC P3NoGoearly and IC P3NoGolate according to the conditions and time interval in which they occurred. A sub-group of 28 individuals was also assessed with neuropsychological tests. The test parameters were selected on the basis of studies demonstrating their sensitivity to executive processes as defined in the ROtman-Baycrest Battery for Investigating Attention (ROBBIA) model. The test scores were categorized into the domain scores of energization, monitoring and task setting and correlated with the amplitudes of the individual ICs from the sub-group of 28 individuals. The energization domain correlated with the IC CNVlate and IC P3NoGoearly. The monitoring domain correlated with the IC P3NoGolate, while the task setting domain correlated with the IC CNVlate. The IC CNVearly was not correlated with any of the neuropsychological domain scores. The correlations between the domains and ICs remained largely unchanged when controlling for full-scale IQ. This is the first study to demonstrate that executive processes, as indexed by neuropsychological test parameters, are associated with particular event-related potentials in a cued Go/NoGo paradigm

The role of subjective experiences in conflict tasks : a review

Cognitive control research is concerned with the question how we install adaptive behaviour in the case of (cognitive) conflict. In this review we focus on the role that awareness of this conflict plays in our ability to exert cognitive control. We will argue that visual conflict is not the only building block of metacognitive experiences of conflict and discuss how they are related to cognitive control. So, a first aim of the current review is to understand how these different metacognitive judgements are created. To do so, we draw some remarkable parallels with research on metacognition in decision making and memory research. Next, we elaborate on the relationship between metacognition and adaptive behaviour, with a specific focus on the role of subjective experiences in the Gratton effect. The grey areas that persist in the current literature are highlighted. In addition to deciphering the mechanisms of metacognitive judgements in cognitive control, this overview also aims to further enlarge our understanding of metacognitive abilities at a more general level

Motor expertise modulates unconscious rather than conscious executive control

Background Executive control, the ability to regulate the execution of a goal-directed task, is an important element in an athlete’s skill set. Although previous studies have shown that executive control in athletes is better than that in non-athletes, those studies were mainly confined to conscious executive control. Many recent studies have suggested that executive control can be triggered by the presentation of visual stimuli without participant’s conscious awareness. However, few studies have examined unconscious executive control in sports. Thus, the present study investigated whether, similar to conscious executive control, unconscious executive control in table tennis athletes is superior to that in non-athletes. Methods In total, 42 age-matched undergraduate students were recruited for this study; 22 nonathletic students lacking practical athletic experience comprised one group, and 20 table tennis athletes with many years of training in this sport comprised a second group. Each participant first completed an unconscious response priming task, the unconscious processing of visual-spatial information, and then completed a conscious version of this same response priming task. Results Table tennis athletes showed a significant response priming effect, whereas non-athletes did not, when participants were unable to consciously perceive the visual-spatial priming stimuli. In addition, the number of years the table tennis athletes had trained in this sport (a measure of their motor expertise) was positively correlated with the strength of the unconscious response priming effect. However, both table tennis athletes and non-athletes showed a response priming effect when the primes were unmasked and the participants were able to consciously perceive the visual-spatial priming stimuli. Conclusion Our results suggest that motor expertise modulates unconscious, rather than conscious, executive control and that motor expertise is positively correlated with unconscious executive control in table tennis athletes

Don’t make me angry, you wouldn’t like me when I’m angry: volitional choices to act or inhibit are modulated by subliminal perception of emotional faces

Volitional action and self-control—feelings of acting according to one’s own intentions and in being control of one’s own actions—are fundamental aspects of human conscious experience. However, it is unknown whether high-level cognitive control mechanisms are affected by socially salient but nonconscious emotional cues. In this study, we manipulated free choice decisions to act or withhold an action by subliminally presenting emotional faces: In a novel version of the Go/NoGo paradigm, participants made speeded button-press responses to Go targets, withheld responses to NoGo targets, and made spontaneous, free choices to execute or withhold the response for Choice targets. Before each target, we presented emotional faces, backwards masked to render them nonconscious. In Intentional trials, subliminal angry faces made participants more likely to voluntarily withhold the action, whereas fearful and happy faces had no effects. In a second experiment, the faces were made supraliminal, which eliminated the effects of angry faces on volitional choices. A third experiment measured neural correlates of the effects of subliminal angry faces on intentional choice using EEG. After replicating the behavioural results found in Experiment 1, we identified a frontal-midline theta component—associated with cognitive control processes—which is present for volitional decisions, and is modulated by subliminal angry faces. This suggests a mechanism whereby subliminally presented “threat” stimuli affect conscious control processes. In summary, nonconscious perception of angry faces increases choices to inhibit, and subliminal influences on volitional action are deep seated and ecologically embedded

Association and Inhibition

What is inhibition? The “problem of inhibition” is one that has puzzled learning theorists for many decades. Once it had been demonstrated that pairing a CS ( s uch as a tone or a light) with a US (such as food or shock) produced excitatory conditioning (Pavlov 1927 , and see Chapter 2 of Mackintosh 1974), it was natural to consider if a signal could “undo” the effect of an excitatory CS. We now call such a signal a Conditioned Inhibitor . A viable recipe for producing conditioned in hibition is to use a design such as A+ AB - , which simply denotes trials where A and the US are paired , interspersed with trials where A and B occur in compound but without the US. The result is that B acquires the properties of being hard to condition to that US (i.e. , it passes the retardation test for a conditioned inhibitor), and of suppressing excitatory responding when presented in compound with A or with another excitatory CS that has been conditioned with the same US (i.e. , it passes the summation te st for conditioned inhibition). In this chapter, we will ask what it is about B that enables it to pass these tests, and what it is about the A+ AB - design that confers these properties. But first we must consider another use of the term “inhibition”, one that is just as prevalent amongst cognitive psychologists, but gives a somewhat different meaning to the concept

Association, inhibition, and action

This chapter reviews some of the basic properties of conditioned inhibition as studied in animals, and considers the extent to which these phenomena also apply to humans. The response-interference account of negative priming is akin to the interference account of conditioned inhibition that assumes US-US interference. The chapter focuses then switches to top-down cognitive and motor inhibition and an evaluation of the extent to which it can be associatively mediated. The idea that responses or motor actions can be inhibited in a top-down fashion receives the strongest support from paradigms such as the go/no-go paradigm and the stop-signal paradigm. The chapter reviews the evidence for this phenomenon and again seeks to establish some of its basic characteristics. It ends by taking an overtly computational perspective on both sets of phenomena as one can look for similarities and differences between them