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Rostami Z, Salari M, Mahdavi S, Etemadifar M. Abnormal multisensory temporal discrimination in Parkinson's disease. Brain Res 2024; 1834:148901. [PMID: 38561085 DOI: 10.1016/j.brainres.2024.148901] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/27/2023] [Revised: 03/23/2024] [Accepted: 03/28/2024] [Indexed: 04/04/2024]
Abstract
Cognitive deficits are prevalent in Parkinson's disease (PD), ranging from mild deficits in perception and executive function to severe dementia. Multisensory integration (MSI), the ability to pool information from different sensory modalities to form a combined, coherent perception of the environment, is known to be impaired in PD. This study investigated the disruption of audiovisual MSI in PD patients by evaluating temporal discrimination ability between auditory and visual stimuli with different stimulus onset asynchronies (SOAs). The experiment was conducted with Fifteen PD patients and fifteen age-matched healthy controls where participants were requested to report whether the audiovisual stimuli pairs were temporal simultaneous. The temporal binding window (TBW), the time during which sensory modalities are perceived as synchronous, was adapted as the comparison index between PD patients and healthy individuals. Our results showed that PD patients had a significantly wider TBW than healthy controls, indicating abnormal audiovisual temporal discrimination. Furthermore, PD patients had more difficulty in discriminating temporal asynchrony in visual-first, but not in auditory-first stimuli, compared to healthy controls. In contrast, no significant difference was observed for auditory-first stimuli. PD patients also had shorter reaction times than healthy controls regardless of stimulus priority. Together, our findings point to abnormal audiovisual temporal discrimination, a major component of MSI irregularity, in PD patients. These results have important implications for future models of MSI experiments and models that aim to uncover the underlying mechanism of MSI in patients afflicted with PD.
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Affiliation(s)
- Zahra Rostami
- Clinical Research Development Unit, Shohada-e Tajrish Hospital, Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran; School of Medicine, Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran
| | - Mehri Salari
- Clinical Research Development Unit, Shohada-e Tajrish Hospital, Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran; School of Medicine, Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran.
| | - Sara Mahdavi
- School of Medicine, Alborz University of Medical Sciences, Karaj, Iran
| | - Masoud Etemadifar
- Faculty of Medicine, Isfahan University of Medical Science, Isfahan, Iran
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2
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Klaffehn AL, Herbort O, Pfister R. The fusion point of temporal binding: Promises and perils of multisensory accounts. Cogn Psychol 2024; 151:101662. [PMID: 38772251 DOI: 10.1016/j.cogpsych.2024.101662] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/07/2022] [Revised: 04/12/2024] [Accepted: 04/18/2024] [Indexed: 05/23/2024]
Abstract
Performing an action to initiate a consequence in the environment triggers the perceptual illusion of temporal binding. This phenomenon entails that actions and following effects are perceived to occur closer in time than they do outside the action-effect relationship. Here we ask whether temporal binding can be explained in terms of multisensory integration, by assuming either multisensory fusion or partial integration of the two events. We gathered two datasets featuring a wide range of action-effect delays as a key factor influencing integration. We then tested the fit of a computational model for multisensory integration, the statistically optimal cue integration (SOCI) model. Indeed, qualitative aspects of the data on a group-level followed the principles of a multisensory account. By contrast, quantitative evidence from a comprehensive model evaluation indicated that temporal binding cannot be reduced to multisensory integration. Rather, multisensory integration should be seen as one of several component processes underlying temporal binding on an individual level.
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Affiliation(s)
| | | | - Roland Pfister
- Trier University, Germany; Institute for Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience (ICAN), University of Trier, Germany
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3
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Marsicano G, Bertini C, Ronconi L. Alpha-band sensory entrainment improves audiovisual temporal acuity. Psychon Bull Rev 2024; 31:874-885. [PMID: 37783899 DOI: 10.3758/s13423-023-02388-x] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 09/10/2023] [Indexed: 10/04/2023]
Abstract
Visual and auditory stimuli are transmitted from the environment to sensory cortices with different timing, requiring the brain to encode when sensory inputs must be segregated or integrated into a single percept. The probability that different audiovisual (AV) stimuli are integrated into a single percept even when presented asynchronously is reflected in the construct of temporal binding window (TBW). There is a strong interest in testing whether it is possible to broaden or shrink TBW by using different neuromodulatory approaches that can speed up or slow down ongoing alpha oscillations, which have been repeatedly hypothesized to be an important determinant of the TBWs size. Here, we employed a web-based sensory entrainment protocol combined with a simultaneity judgment task using simple flash-beep stimuli. The aim was to test whether AV temporal acuity could be modulated trial by trial by synchronizing ongoing neural oscillations in the prestimulus period to a rhythmic sensory stream presented in the upper (∼12 Hz) or lower (∼8.5 Hz) alpha range. As a control, we implemented a nonrhythmic condition where only the first and the last entrainers were employed. Results show that upper alpha entrainment shrinks AV TBW and improves AV temporal acuity when compared with lower alpha and control conditions. Our findings represent a proof of concept of the efficacy of sensory entrainment to improve AV temporal acuity in a trial-by-trial manner, and they strengthen the idea that alpha oscillations may reflect the temporal unit of AV temporal binding.
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Affiliation(s)
- Gianluca Marsicano
- Department of Psychology, University of Bologna, Viale Berti Pichat 5, 40121, Bologna, Italy
- Centre for Studies and Research in Cognitive Neuroscience, University of Bologna, Via Rasi e Spinelli 176, 47023, Cesena, Italy
| | - Caterina Bertini
- Department of Psychology, University of Bologna, Viale Berti Pichat 5, 40121, Bologna, Italy
- Centre for Studies and Research in Cognitive Neuroscience, University of Bologna, Via Rasi e Spinelli 176, 47023, Cesena, Italy
| | - Luca Ronconi
- School of Psychology, Vita-Salute San Raffaele University, Via Olgettina 58, 20132, Milan, Italy.
- Division of Neuroscience, IRCCS San Raffaele Scientific Institute, Milan, Italy.
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Malone AK, Hungerford ME, Smith SB, Chang NYN, Uchanski RM, Oh YH, Lewis RF, Hullar TE. Age-Related Changes in Temporal Binding Involving Auditory and Vestibular Inputs. Semin Hear 2024; 45:110-122. [PMID: 38370520 PMCID: PMC10872654 DOI: 10.1055/s-0043-1770137] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 02/20/2024] Open
Abstract
Maintaining balance involves the combination of sensory signals from the visual, vestibular, proprioceptive, and auditory systems. However, physical and biological constraints ensure that these signals are perceived slightly asynchronously. The brain only recognizes them as simultaneous when they occur within a period of time called the temporal binding window (TBW). Aging can prolong the TBW, leading to temporal uncertainty during multisensory integration. This effect might contribute to imbalance in the elderly but has not been examined with respect to vestibular inputs. Here, we compared the vestibular-related TBW in 13 younger and 12 older subjects undergoing 0.5 Hz sinusoidal rotations about the earth-vertical axis. An alternating dichotic auditory stimulus was presented at the same frequency but with the phase varied to determine the temporal range over which the two stimuli were perceived as simultaneous at least 75% of the time, defined as the TBW. The mean TBW among younger subjects was 286 ms (SEM ± 56 ms) and among older subjects was 560 ms (SEM ± 52 ms). TBW was related to vestibular sensitivity among younger but not older subjects, suggesting that a prolonged TBW could be a mechanism for imbalance in the elderly person independent of changes in peripheral vestibular function.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Michelle E. Hungerford
- VA RR&D National Center for Rehabilitative Auditory Research, VA Portland Health Care System, Portland, Oregon
- Department of Otolaryngology—Head and Neck Surgery, Oregon Health and Science University, Portland, Oregon
| | - Spencer B. Smith
- Department of Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences, University of Texas, Austin, Texas
| | - Nai-Yuan N. Chang
- Department of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery, Oregon Health and Science University, Portland, Oregon
| | - Rosalie M. Uchanski
- Department of Otolaryngology - Head and Neck Surgery, Washington University in St. Louis, St. Louis, Missouri
| | - Yong-Hee Oh
- University of Louisville, Louisville, Kentucky
| | - Richard F. Lewis
- Departments of Otolaryngology and Neurology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts
| | - Timothy E. Hullar
- VA RR&D National Center for Rehabilitative Auditory Research, VA Portland Health Care System, Portland, Oregon
- Department of Otolaryngology—Head and Neck Surgery, Oregon Health and Science University, Portland, Oregon
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Jones SA, Noppeney U. Multisensory Integration and Causal Inference in Typical and Atypical Populations. ADVANCES IN EXPERIMENTAL MEDICINE AND BIOLOGY 2024; 1437:59-76. [PMID: 38270853 DOI: 10.1007/978-981-99-7611-9_4] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 01/26/2024]
Abstract
Multisensory perception is critical for effective interaction with the environment, but human responses to multisensory stimuli vary across the lifespan and appear changed in some atypical populations. In this review chapter, we consider multisensory integration within a normative Bayesian framework. We begin by outlining the complex computational challenges of multisensory causal inference and reliability-weighted cue integration, and discuss whether healthy young adults behave in accordance with normative Bayesian models. We then compare their behaviour with various other human populations (children, older adults, and those with neurological or neuropsychiatric disorders). In particular, we consider whether the differences seen in these groups are due only to changes in their computational parameters (such as sensory noise or perceptual priors), or whether the fundamental computational principles (such as reliability weighting) underlying multisensory perception may also be altered. We conclude by arguing that future research should aim explicitly to differentiate between these possibilities.
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Affiliation(s)
- Samuel A Jones
- Department of Psychology, Nottingham Trent University, Nottingham, UK.
| | - Uta Noppeney
- Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition and Behaviour, Radboud University, Nijmegen, The Netherlands
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Wang L, Lin L, Ren J. The characteristics of audiovisual temporal integration in streaming-bouncing bistable motion perception: considering both implicit and explicit processing perspectives. Cereb Cortex 2023; 33:11541-11555. [PMID: 37874024 DOI: 10.1093/cercor/bhad388] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/06/2023] [Revised: 10/01/2023] [Accepted: 10/02/2023] [Indexed: 10/25/2023] Open
Abstract
This study explored the behavioral and neural activity characteristics of audiovisual temporal integration in motion perception from both implicit and explicit perspectives. The streaming-bouncing bistable paradigm (SB task) was employed to investigate implicit temporal integration, while the corresponding simultaneity judgment task (SJ task) was used to examine explicit temporal integration. The behavioral results revealed a negative correlation between implicit and explicit temporal processing. In the ERP results of both tasks, three neural phases (PD100, ND180, and PD290) in the fronto-central region were identified as reflecting integration effects and the auditory-evoked multisensory N1 component may serve as a primary component responsible for cross-modal temporal processing. However, there were significant differences between the VA ERPs in the SB and SJ tasks and the influence of speed on implicit and explicit integration effects also varied. The aforementioned results, building upon the validation of previous temporal renormalization theory, suggest that implicit and explicit temporal integration operate under distinct processing modes within a shared neural network. This underscores the brain's flexibility and adaptability in cross-modal temporal processing.
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Affiliation(s)
- Luning Wang
- School of Psychology, Shanghai University of Sport, No. 399, Changhai Road, Yangpu District, Shanghai, 200438, China
| | - Liyue Lin
- School of Psychology, Shanghai University of Sport, No. 399, Changhai Road, Yangpu District, Shanghai, 200438, China
| | - Jie Ren
- China Table Tennis College, Shanghai University of Sport, No. 399, Changhai Road, Yangpu District, Shanghai, 200438, China
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7
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Basharat A, Mehrabi S, Muñoz JE, Middleton LE, Cao S, Boger J, Barnett-Cowan M. Virtual reality as a tool to explore multisensory processing before and after engagement in physical activity. Front Aging Neurosci 2023; 15:1207651. [PMID: 38020766 PMCID: PMC10652573 DOI: 10.3389/fnagi.2023.1207651] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/17/2023] [Accepted: 10/02/2023] [Indexed: 12/01/2023] Open
Abstract
Introduction This pilot study employed a non-randomized control trial design to explore the impact of physical activity within a virtual reality (VR) environment on multisensory processing among community-dwelling older adults. Methods The investigation compared both chronic (over 6 weeks) and acute effects of VR-based physical activity to a reading control group. The evaluation metrics for multisensory processing included audiovisual response time (RT), simultaneity judgments (SJ), sound-induced flash illusion (SIFI), and temporal order judgments (TOJ). A total of 13 older adults were provided with VR headsets featuring custom-designed games, while another 14 older adults were assigned to a reading-based control group. Results Results indicated that acute engagement in physical activity led to higher accuracy in the SIFI task (experimental group: 85.6%; control group: 78.2%; p = 0.037). Additionally, both chronic and acute physical activity resulted in quicker response times (chronic: experimental group = 336.92; control group = 381.31; p = 0.012; acute: experimental group = 333.38; control group = 383.09; p = 0.006). Although the reading group showed a non-significant trend for greater improvement in mean RT, covariate analyses revealed that this discrepancy was due to the older age of the reading group. Discussion The findings suggest that immersive VR has potential utility for enhancing multisensory processing in older adults. However, future studies must rigorously control for participant variables like age and sex to ensure more accurate comparisons between experimental and control conditions.
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Affiliation(s)
- Aysha Basharat
- Department of Kinesiology and Health Sciences, Faculty of Health, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON, Canada
| | - Samira Mehrabi
- Department of Kinesiology and Health Sciences, Faculty of Health, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON, Canada
| | - John E. Muñoz
- Department of Systems Design Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON, Canada
| | | | - Shi Cao
- Department of Systems Design Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON, Canada
| | | | - Michael Barnett-Cowan
- Department of Kinesiology and Health Sciences, Faculty of Health, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON, Canada
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Newell FN, McKenna E, Seveso MA, Devine I, Alahmad F, Hirst RJ, O'Dowd A. Multisensory perception constrains the formation of object categories: a review of evidence from sensory-driven and predictive processes on categorical decisions. Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci 2023; 378:20220342. [PMID: 37545304 PMCID: PMC10404931 DOI: 10.1098/rstb.2022.0342] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/10/2023] [Accepted: 06/29/2023] [Indexed: 08/08/2023] Open
Abstract
Although object categorization is a fundamental cognitive ability, it is also a complex process going beyond the perception and organization of sensory stimulation. Here we review existing evidence about how the human brain acquires and organizes multisensory inputs into object representations that may lead to conceptual knowledge in memory. We first focus on evidence for two processes on object perception, multisensory integration of redundant information (e.g. seeing and feeling a shape) and crossmodal, statistical learning of complementary information (e.g. the 'moo' sound of a cow and its visual shape). For both processes, the importance attributed to each sensory input in constructing a multisensory representation of an object depends on the working range of the specific sensory modality, the relative reliability or distinctiveness of the encoded information and top-down predictions. Moreover, apart from sensory-driven influences on perception, the acquisition of featural information across modalities can affect semantic memory and, in turn, influence category decisions. In sum, we argue that both multisensory processes independently constrain the formation of object categories across the lifespan, possibly through early and late integration mechanisms, respectively, to allow us to efficiently achieve the everyday, but remarkable, ability of recognizing objects. This article is part of the theme issue 'Decision and control processes in multisensory perception'.
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Affiliation(s)
- F. N. Newell
- School of Psychology and Institute of Neuroscience, Trinity College Dublin, College Green, Dublin D02 PN40, Ireland
| | - E. McKenna
- School of Psychology and Institute of Neuroscience, Trinity College Dublin, College Green, Dublin D02 PN40, Ireland
| | - M. A. Seveso
- School of Psychology and Institute of Neuroscience, Trinity College Dublin, College Green, Dublin D02 PN40, Ireland
| | - I. Devine
- School of Psychology and Institute of Neuroscience, Trinity College Dublin, College Green, Dublin D02 PN40, Ireland
| | - F. Alahmad
- School of Psychology and Institute of Neuroscience, Trinity College Dublin, College Green, Dublin D02 PN40, Ireland
| | - R. J. Hirst
- School of Psychology and Institute of Neuroscience, Trinity College Dublin, College Green, Dublin D02 PN40, Ireland
| | - A. O'Dowd
- School of Psychology and Institute of Neuroscience, Trinity College Dublin, College Green, Dublin D02 PN40, Ireland
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Fujii Y, Kuroda N, Teraoka R, Harada S, Teramoto W. Age-related differences in temporal binding and the influence of action body parts. Iperception 2023; 14:20416695231208547. [PMID: 37915859 PMCID: PMC10617286 DOI: 10.1177/20416695231208547] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/21/2022] [Accepted: 10/03/2023] [Indexed: 11/03/2023] Open
Abstract
If voluntary action is followed by an effect with a short time delay, the time interval between action and effect is often perceived to be shorter than it actually is. This perceptual time compression is termed intentional binding or temporal binding. We investigated age-related changes in adulthood considering temporal binding and its dependence on action body parts (i.e., hand vs. foot). This experiment included 17 young adults (mean age: 21.71 ± 3.14 years) and 27 older adults (mean age: 74.41 ± 3.38 years). Participants performed a button press task using their index fingers (hand condition) or toes (foot condition). The results showed that older participants exhibited a strong time compression comparable to young participants in the voluntary condition. Older participants also showed a strong time compression in involuntary action, which was induced by a mechanical device, differently from young participants. In line with previous research, the present age-related differences in time compression considering involuntary action suggest that causal belief significantly influences event perception rather than the associated intention of action or sensory afferents. The present results also suggest that the nature of action body parts has no significant influence on temporal binding, independent of age group.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yoshitaka Fujii
- College of Comprehensive Psychology, Ritsumeikan University, Ibaraki-shi, Osaka, Japan; Graduate School of Humanities and Social Sciences, Kumamoto University, Chuo-ku, Kumamoto, Japan
| | - Naoki Kuroda
- Graduate School of Humanities and Social Sciences, Kumamoto University, Chuo-ku, Kumamoto, Japan; Graduate School of Social and Cultural Sciences, Kumamoto University, Chuo-ku, Kumamoto, Japan
| | - Ryo Teraoka
- Graduate School of Engineering, Muroran Institute of Technology, Muroran, Hokkaido, Japan; Graduate School of Humanities and Social Sciences, Kumamoto University, Chuo-ku, Kumamoto, Japan
| | - Shinya Harada
- Graduate School of Humanities and Social Sciences, Kumamoto University, Chuo-ku, Kumamoto, Japan
| | - Wataru Teramoto
- Graduate School of Humanities and Social Sciences, Kumamoto University, Chuo-ku, Kumamoto, Japan
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10
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Kim JS, Lee SA. Hippocampal orchestration of associative and sequential memory networks for episodic retrieval. Cell Rep 2023; 42:112989. [PMID: 37581985 DOI: 10.1016/j.celrep.2023.112989] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/16/2023] [Revised: 06/16/2023] [Accepted: 08/01/2023] [Indexed: 08/17/2023] Open
Abstract
Episodic memory involves the recollection of contextual details replayed mentally across time. Here, we propose the association-sequence network (ASN) model, characterizing complementary cortico-hippocampal networks underlying the retrieval of simultaneously associated and sequentially ordered events. Participants viewed objects, presented singly or in pairs, and later reported whether two objects were shown simultaneously, consecutively, or farther apart in time. Behavioral results and hippocampal activation reveal a correlation between the two sequential conditions but not the simultaneous condition, despite the temporal proximity of consecutive pairs. We also find that anterior hippocampal activity is modulated by temporal distance. Distinct cortical networks are engaged during simultaneous and sequential memory (prefrontal cortex and angular gyrus for association; supplementary motor cortex and precuneus for sequence); notably, these regions show differential connectivity with the hippocampus. The ASN model provides a comprehensive framework for how we reconstruct memories that are both rich in associative detail and temporally dynamic in nature.
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Affiliation(s)
- Ji Sun Kim
- Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences, Seoul National University, Seoul 08826, Korea
| | - Sang Ah Lee
- Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences, Seoul National University, Seoul 08826, Korea.
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11
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Pepper JL, Usherwood B, Bampouras TM, Nuttall HE. Age-related changes to the attentional modulation of temporal binding. Atten Percept Psychophys 2023; 85:1905-1919. [PMID: 37495933 PMCID: PMC10545588 DOI: 10.3758/s13414-023-02756-8] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 06/20/2023] [Indexed: 07/28/2023]
Abstract
During multisensory integration, the time range within which visual and auditory information can be perceived as synchronous and bound together is known as the temporal binding window (TBW). With increasing age, the TBW becomes wider, such that older adults erroneously, and often dangerously, integrate sensory inputs that are asynchronous. Recent research suggests that attentional cues can narrow the width of the TBW in younger adults, sharpening temporal perception and increasing the accuracy of integration. However, due to their age-related declines in attentional control, it is not yet known whether older adults can deploy attentional resources to narrow the TBW in the same way as younger adults. This study investigated the age-related changes to the attentional modulation of the TBW. Thirty younger and 30 older adults completed a cued-spatial-attention version of the stream-bounce illusion, assessing the extent to which the visual and auditory stimuli were integrated when presented at three different stimulus-onset asynchronies, and when attending to a validly cued or invalidly cued location. A 2 × 2 × 3 mixed ANOVA revealed that when participants attended to the validly cued location (i.e., when attention was present), susceptibility to the stream-bounce illusion decreased. However, crucially, this attentional manipulation significantly affected audiovisual integration in younger adults, but not in older adults. These findings suggest that older adults have multisensory integration-related attentional deficits. Directions for future research and practical applications surrounding treatments to improve the safety of older adults' perception and navigation through the environment are discussed.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jessica L. Pepper
- Department of Psychology, Fylde College, Lancaster University, Lancaster, UK LA1 4YF
| | - Barrie Usherwood
- Department of Psychology, Fylde College, Lancaster University, Lancaster, UK LA1 4YF
| | - Theodoros M. Bampouras
- School of Sport and Exercise Sciences, Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpool, UK L3 3AF
| | - Helen E. Nuttall
- Department of Psychology, Fylde College, Lancaster University, Lancaster, UK LA1 4YF
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12
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Pepper JL, Nuttall HE. Age-Related Changes to Multisensory Integration and Audiovisual Speech Perception. Brain Sci 2023; 13:1126. [PMID: 37626483 PMCID: PMC10452685 DOI: 10.3390/brainsci13081126] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/26/2023] [Revised: 07/20/2023] [Accepted: 07/22/2023] [Indexed: 08/27/2023] Open
Abstract
Multisensory integration is essential for the quick and accurate perception of our environment, particularly in everyday tasks like speech perception. Research has highlighted the importance of investigating bottom-up and top-down contributions to multisensory integration and how these change as a function of ageing. Specifically, perceptual factors like the temporal binding window and cognitive factors like attention and inhibition appear to be fundamental in the integration of visual and auditory information-integration that may become less efficient as we age. These factors have been linked to brain areas like the superior temporal sulcus, with neural oscillations in the alpha-band frequency also being implicated in multisensory processing. Age-related changes in multisensory integration may have significant consequences for the well-being of our increasingly ageing population, affecting their ability to communicate with others and safely move through their environment; it is crucial that the evidence surrounding this subject continues to be carefully investigated. This review will discuss research into age-related changes in the perceptual and cognitive mechanisms of multisensory integration and the impact that these changes have on speech perception and fall risk. The role of oscillatory alpha activity is of particular interest, as it may be key in the modulation of multisensory integration.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Helen E. Nuttall
- Department of Psychology, Lancaster University, Bailrigg LA1 4YF, UK;
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13
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Long-term Tai Chi training reduces the fusion illusion in older adults. Exp Brain Res 2023; 241:517-526. [PMID: 36611123 DOI: 10.1007/s00221-023-06544-6] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/15/2022] [Accepted: 01/01/2023] [Indexed: 01/09/2023]
Abstract
Sound-induced flash illusion (SiFI) is an auditory-dominated audiovisual integration phenomenon that can be used as a reliable indicator of audiovisual integration. Although previous studies have found that Tai Chi exercise has a promoting effect on cognitive processing, such as executive functions, the effect of Tai Chi exercise on early perceptual processing has yet to be investigated. This study used the classic SiFI paradigm to investigate the effects of long-term Tai Chi exercise on multisensory integration in older adults. We compared older adults with long-term Tai Chi exercise experience with those with long-term walking exercise. The results showed that the accuracy of the Tai Chi group was higher than that of the control group under the fusion illusion condition, mainly due to the increased perceptual sensitivity to flashes. However, there was no significant difference between the two groups in the fission illusion. These results indicated that the fission and fusion illusions were affected differently by Tai Chi exercise, and this was attributable to the association of the participants' flash discriminability with them. The present study provides preliminary evidence that long-term Tai Chi exercise improves older adults' multisensory integration, which occurs in early perceptual processing.
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14
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Mafi F, Tang MF, Afarinesh MR, Ghasemian S, Sheibani V, Arabzadeh E. Temporal order judgment of multisensory stimuli in rat and human. Front Behav Neurosci 2023; 16:1070452. [PMID: 36710957 PMCID: PMC9879721 DOI: 10.3389/fnbeh.2022.1070452] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/14/2022] [Accepted: 12/16/2022] [Indexed: 01/13/2023] Open
Abstract
We do not fully understand the resolution at which temporal information is processed by different species. Here we employed a temporal order judgment (TOJ) task in rats and humans to test the temporal precision with which these species can detect the order of presentation of simple stimuli across two modalities of vision and audition. Both species reported the order of audiovisual stimuli when they were presented from a central location at a range of stimulus onset asynchronies (SOA)s. While both species could reliably distinguish the temporal order of stimuli based on their sensory content (i.e., the modality label), rats outperformed humans at short SOAs (less than 100 ms) whereas humans outperformed rats at long SOAs (greater than 100 ms). Moreover, rats produced faster responses compared to humans. The reaction time data further revealed key differences in decision process across the two species: at longer SOAs, reaction times increased in rats but decreased in humans. Finally, drift-diffusion modeling allowed us to isolate the contribution of various parameters including evidence accumulation rates, lapse and bias to the sensory decision. Consistent with the psychophysical findings, the model revealed higher temporal sensitivity and a higher lapse rate in rats compared to humans. These findings suggest that these species applied different strategies for making perceptual decisions in the context of a multimodal TOJ task.
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Affiliation(s)
- Fatemeh Mafi
- Neuroscience Research Center, Institute of Neuropharmacology, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Kerman, Iran
- Cognitive Neuroscience Research Center, Institute of Neuropharmacology, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Kerman, Iran
| | - Matthew F. Tang
- Eccles Institute of Neuroscience, John Curtin School of Medical Research, The Australian National University, Canberra, ACT, Australia
| | - Mohammad Reza Afarinesh
- Neuroscience Research Center, Institute of Neuropharmacology, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Kerman, Iran
- Cognitive Neuroscience Research Center, Institute of Neuropharmacology, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Kerman, Iran
| | - Sadegh Ghasemian
- Neuroscience Research Center, Institute of Neuropharmacology, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Kerman, Iran
- Cognitive Neuroscience Research Center, Institute of Neuropharmacology, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Kerman, Iran
| | - Vahid Sheibani
- Neuroscience Research Center, Institute of Neuropharmacology, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Kerman, Iran
- Cognitive Neuroscience Research Center, Institute of Neuropharmacology, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Kerman, Iran
| | - Ehsan Arabzadeh
- Neuroscience Research Center, Institute of Neuropharmacology, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Kerman, Iran
- Cognitive Neuroscience Research Center, Institute of Neuropharmacology, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Kerman, Iran
- Eccles Institute of Neuroscience, John Curtin School of Medical Research, The Australian National University, Canberra, ACT, Australia
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15
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Arrouet A, Polgári P, Giersch A, Joos E. Temporal Order Judgments in Schizophrenia and Bipolar Disorders – Explicit and Implicit Measures. TIMING & TIME PERCEPTION 2022. [DOI: 10.1163/22134468-bja10071] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/27/2022]
Abstract
Abstract
Ordering events in time is essential for the understanding of causal relationships between successive events. Incorrect causal links can lead to false beliefs and an altered perception of reality. These symptoms belong to psychosis, which is present in schizophrenia (SZ) spectrum and bipolar (BP) disorder. Experimental results show that patients with SZ have an altered perception of temporal order, while there are no data in patients with BP. We investigated the ability of patients with SZ, BP, and controls to judge the order of stimuli with a 100-ms Stimulus Onset Asynchrony (SOA), and how such large asynchronies facilitate temporal order judgments for small asynchronies. Explicit temporal order effects suggest that patients with SZ perform worse at a long SOA (100 ms) as compared to controls, whereas patients with BP show no difference compared to controls or to patients with SZ. Implicit order effects reveal improved performances in case of identical as compared to different relative order between two successive trials for all groups, with no differences between the groups. We replicated explicit order impairments in patients with SZ compared to controls, while implicit effects appear to be preserved. This difficulty for patients to consciously order stimuli in time might be understood under the light of the loosening-of-associations phenomenon well described in SZ. Further, we showed that patients with BP do not reveal such an explicit order impairment which is consistent with phenomenological descriptions, suggesting a difference in time experience in patients with SZ and BP.
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Affiliation(s)
- Alana Arrouet
- INSERM U1114, Cognitive Neuropsychology and Pathophysiology of Schizophrenia, 1 place de l’Hôpital, 67091 Strasbourg Cedex, France
- CERVO Brain Research Centre, 2301 Av. D’Estimauville, Québec, QC G1E 1T2, Canada
| | - Patrik Polgári
- INSERM U1114, Cognitive Neuropsychology and Pathophysiology of Schizophrenia, 1 place de l’Hôpital, 67091 Strasbourg Cedex, France
| | - Anne Giersch
- INSERM U1114, Cognitive Neuropsychology and Pathophysiology of Schizophrenia, 1 place de l’Hôpital, 67091 Strasbourg Cedex, France
| | - Ellen Joos
- INSERM U1114, Cognitive Neuropsychology and Pathophysiology of Schizophrenia, 1 place de l’Hôpital, 67091 Strasbourg Cedex, France
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16
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Sadiq O, Barnett-Cowan M. Can the Perceived Timing of Multisensory Events Predict Cybersickness? Multisens Res 2022; 35:623-652. [PMID: 36731533 DOI: 10.1163/22134808-bja10083] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/19/2021] [Accepted: 09/06/2022] [Indexed: 02/07/2023]
Abstract
Humans are constantly presented with rich sensory information that the central nervous system (CNS) must process to form a coherent perception of the self and its relation to its surroundings. While the CNS is efficient in processing multisensory information in natural environments, virtual reality (VR) poses challenges of temporal discrepancies that the CNS must solve. These temporal discrepancies between information from different sensory modalities leads to inconsistencies in perception of the virtual environment which often causes cybersickness. Here, we investigate whether individual differences in the perceived relative timing of sensory events, specifically parameters of temporal-order judgement (TOJ), can predict cybersickness. Study 1 examined audiovisual (AV) TOJs while Study 2 examined audio-active head movement (AAHM) TOJs. We deduced metrics of the temporal binding window (TBW) and point of subjective simultaneity (PSS) for a total of 50 participants. Cybersickness was quantified using the Simulator Sickness Questionnaire (SSQ). Study 1 results (correlations and multiple regression) show that the oculomotor SSQ shares a significant yet positive correlation with AV PSS and TBW. While there is a positive correlation between the total SSQ scores and the TBW and PSS, these correlations are not significant. Therefore, although these results are promising, we did not find the same effect for AAHM TBW and PSS. We conclude that AV TOJ may serve as a potential tool to predict cybersickness in VR. Such findings will generate a better understanding of cybersickness which can be used for development of VR to help mitigate discomfort and maximize adoption.
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Affiliation(s)
- Ogai Sadiq
- Department of Kinesiology, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON, N2L 3G1, Canada
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17
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Perceptual training narrows the temporal binding window of audiovisual integration in both younger and older adults. Neuropsychologia 2022; 173:108309. [PMID: 35752266 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2022.108309] [Citation(s) in RCA: 17] [Impact Index Per Article: 8.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/23/2021] [Revised: 05/16/2022] [Accepted: 06/20/2022] [Indexed: 10/17/2022]
Abstract
There is a growing body of evidence to suggest that multisensory processing changes with advancing age-usually in the form of an enlarged temporal binding window-with some studies linking these multisensory changes to negative clinical outcomes. Perceptual training regimes represent a promising means for enhancing the precision of multisensory integration in ageing; however, to date, the vast majority of studies examining the efficacy of multisensory perceptual learning have focused solely on healthy young adults. Here, we measured the temporal binding windows of younger and older participants before and after training on an audiovisual temporal discrimination task to assess (i) how perceptual training affected the shape of the temporal binding window and (ii) whether training effects were similar in both age groups. Our results replicated previous findings of an enlarged temporal binding window in older adults, as well as providing further evidence that both younger and older participants can improve the precision of their audiovisual timing estimation via perceptual training. We also show that this training protocol led to a narrowing of the temporal binding window associated with the sound-induced flash illusion in both age groups indicating a general refinement of audiovisual integration. However, while younger adults also displayed a general reduction in crossmodal interactions following training, this effect was not observed in the older adult group. Together, our results suggest that perceptual training narrows the temporal binding window of audiovisual integration in both younger and older adults but has less of an impact on prior expectations regarding the source of audiovisual signals in older adults.
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Letts E, Basharat A, Barnett-Cowan M. Evaluating the Effect of Semantic Congruency and Valence on Multisensory Integration. Multisens Res 2022; 35:309-334. [PMID: 35393374 DOI: 10.1163/22134808-bja10073] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/29/2021] [Accepted: 02/21/2022] [Indexed: 11/19/2022]
Abstract
Previous studies have found that semantics, the higher-level meaning of stimuli, can impact multisensory integration; however, less is known about the effect of valence, an affective response to stimuli. This study investigated the effects of both semantic congruency and valence of non-speech audiovisual stimuli on multisensory integration via response time (RT) and temporal-order judgement (TOJ) tasks [assessing processing speed (RT), Point of Subjective Simultaneity (PSS), and time window when multisensory stimuli are likely to be perceived as simultaneous (temporal binding window; TBW)]. Through an online study with 40 participants (mean age: 26.25 years; females = 17), we found that both congruence and valence had a significant main effect on RT (congruency and positive valence decrease RT) and an interaction effect (congruent/positive valence condition being significantly faster than all others). For TOJ, there was a significant main effect of valence and a significant interaction effect where positive valence (compared to negative valence) and the congruent/positive condition (compared to all other conditions) required visual stimuli to be presented significantly earlier than auditory stimuli to be perceived as simultaneous. A subsequent analysis showed a positive correlation between TBW width and RT (as TBW widens, RT increases) for the categories that were furthest from true simultaneity in their PSS (Congruent/Positive and Incongruent/Negative). This study provides new evidence that supports previous research on semantic congruency and presents a novel incorporation of valence into behavioural responses.
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Affiliation(s)
- Elyse Letts
- Faculty of Health, University of Waterloo, 200 University Ave. W, Waterloo, ON, Canada, N2L3G1
| | - Aysha Basharat
- Faculty of Health, University of Waterloo, 200 University Ave. W, Waterloo, ON, Canada, N2L3G1
| | - Michael Barnett-Cowan
- Faculty of Health, University of Waterloo, 200 University Ave. W, Waterloo, ON, Canada, N2L3G1
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Basharat A, Thayanithy A, Barnett-Cowan M. A Scoping Review of Audiovisual Integration Methodology: Screening for Auditory and Visual Impairment in Younger and Older Adults. Front Aging Neurosci 2022; 13:772112. [PMID: 35153716 PMCID: PMC8829696 DOI: 10.3389/fnagi.2021.772112] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/07/2021] [Accepted: 12/17/2021] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
With the rise of the aging population, many scientists studying multisensory integration have turned toward understanding how this process may change with age. This scoping review was conducted to understand and describe the scope and rigor with which researchers studying audiovisual sensory integration screen for hearing and vision impairment. A structured search in three licensed databases (Scopus, PubMed, and PsychInfo) using the key concepts of multisensory integration, audiovisual modality, and aging revealed 2,462 articles, which were screened for inclusion by two reviewers. Articles were included if they (1) tested healthy older adults (minimum mean or median age of 60) with younger adults as a comparison (mean or median age between 18 and 35), (2) measured auditory and visual integration, (3) were written in English, and (4) reported behavioral outcomes. Articles that included the following were excluded: (1) tested taste exclusively, (2) tested olfaction exclusively, (3) tested somatosensation exclusively, (4) tested emotion perception, (5) were not written in English, (6) were clinical commentaries, editorials, interviews, letters, newspaper articles, abstracts only, or non-peer reviewed literature (e.g., theses), and (7) focused on neuroimaging without a behavioral component. Data pertaining to the details of the study (e.g., country of publication, year of publication, etc.) were extracted, however, of higher importance to our research question, data pertaining to screening measures used for hearing and vision impairment (e.g., type of test used, whether hearing- and visual-aids were worn, thresholds used, etc.) were extracted, collated, and summarized. Our search revealed that only 64% of studies screened for age-abnormal hearing impairment, 51% screened for age-abnormal vision impairment, and that consistent definitions of normal or abnormal vision and hearing were not used among the studies that screened for sensory abilities. A total of 1,624 younger adults and 4,778 older participants were included in the scoping review with males composing approximately 44% and females composing 56% of the total sample and most of the data was obtained from only four countries. We recommend that studies investigating the effects of aging on multisensory integration should screen for normal vision and hearing by using the World Health Organization's (WHO) hearing loss and visual impairment cut-off scores in order to maintain consistency among other aging researchers. As mild cognitive impairment (MCI) has been defined as a “transitional” or a “transitory” stage between normal aging and dementia and because approximately 3–5% of the aging population will develop MCI each year, it is therefore important that when researchers aim to study a healthy aging population, that they appropriately screen for MCI. One of our secondary aims was to determine how often researchers were screening for cognitive impairment and the types of tests that were used to do so. Our results revealed that only 55 out of 72 studies tested for neurological and cognitive function, and only a subset used standardized tests. Additionally, among the studies that used standardized tests, the cut-off scores used were not always adequate for screening out mild cognitive impairment. An additional secondary aim of this scoping review was to determine the feasibility of whether a meta-analysis could be conducted in the future to further quantitatively evaluate the results (i.e., are the findings obtained from studies using self-reported vision and hearing impairment screening methods significantly different from those measuring vision and hearing impairment in the lab) and to assess the scope of this problem. We found that it may not be feasible to conduct a meta-analysis with the entire dataset of this scoping review. However, a meta-analysis can be conducted if stricter parameters are used (e.g., focusing on accuracy or response time data only).Systematic Review Registration:https://doi.org/10.17605/OSF.IO/GTUHD.
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20
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Scurry AN, Lovelady Z, Lemus DM, Jiang F. Impoverished Inhibitory Control Exacerbates Multisensory Impairments in Older Fallers. Front Aging Neurosci 2021; 13:700787. [PMID: 34630067 PMCID: PMC8500399 DOI: 10.3389/fnagi.2021.700787] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/26/2021] [Accepted: 08/27/2021] [Indexed: 11/24/2022] Open
Abstract
Impaired temporal perception of multisensory cues is a common phenomenon observed in older adults that can lead to unreliable percepts of the external world. For instance, the sound induced flash illusion (SIFI) can induce an illusory percept of a second flash by presenting a beep close in time to an initial flash-beep pair. Older adults that have enhanced susceptibility to a fall demonstrate significantly stronger illusion percepts during the SIFI task compared to those older adults without any history of falling. We hypothesize that a global inhibitory deficit may be driving the impairments across both postural stability and multisensory function in older adults with a fall history (FH). We investigated oscillatory activity and perceptual performance during the SIFI task, to understand how active sensory processing, measured by gamma (30–80 Hz) power, was regulated by alpha activity (8–13 Hz), oscillations that reflect inhibitory control. Compared to young adults (YA), the FH and non-faller (NF) groups demonstrated enhanced susceptibility to the SIFI. Further, the FH group had significantly greater illusion strength compared to the NF group. The FH group also showed significantly impaired performance relative to YA during congruent trials (2 flash-beep pairs resulting in veridical perception of 2 flashes). In illusion compared to non-illusion trials, the NF group demonstrated reduced alpha power (or diminished inhibitory control). Relative to YA and NF, the FH group showed reduced phase-amplitude coupling between alpha and gamma activity in non-illusion trials. This loss of inhibitory capacity over sensory processing in FH compared to NF suggests a more severe change than that consequent of natural aging.
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Affiliation(s)
- Alexandra N Scurry
- Department of Psychology, University of Nevada, Reno, Reno, NV, United States
| | - Zachary Lovelady
- Department of Psychology, University of Nevada, Reno, Reno, NV, United States
| | - Daniela M Lemus
- Department of Psychology, University of Nevada, Reno, Reno, NV, United States
| | - Fang Jiang
- Department of Psychology, University of Nevada, Reno, Reno, NV, United States
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21
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Scurry AN, Lovelady Z, Jiang F. Task-dependent audiovisual temporal sensitivity is not affected by stimulus intensity levels. Vision Res 2021; 186:71-79. [PMID: 34058622 PMCID: PMC8273142 DOI: 10.1016/j.visres.2021.05.006] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/17/2020] [Revised: 04/30/2021] [Accepted: 05/12/2021] [Indexed: 10/21/2022]
Abstract
Flexibility and robustness of multisensory temporal recalibration is paramount for maintaining perceptual constancy of the surrounding natural world. Different environments impart various impediments, distances and routes that alter the propagation times of sight and sound cues comprising a multimodal event. One's ability to rapidly calibrate and account for these external variations allows for maintained perception of synchrony which is crucial for coherent and consistent perception. The two common paradigms used to compare precision of temporal processing between experimental and control groups, the simultaneity judgment (SJ) and temporal order judgment (TOJ) tasks, often use supra-threshold stimuli. However, few studies have specifically examined the effects of normalizing stimulus intensities to participant's unisensory detection thresholds. The current project presented multiple combinations of auditory and visual stimulus intensity levels, based on individual detection thresholds, during a TOJ and a SJ task. While no effect of stimulus intensity was found on temporal sensitivity or perceived temporal synchrony, there was a significant difference in point of subjective simultaneity (PSS) measures between tasks. In addition, PSS estimates were audio-leading, rather than visual-leading as previously reported, suggesting that exposure to the particular combinations of stimulus intensity levels used influenced temporal synchrony perception. Overall, these results support the use of supra-threshold stimuli in TOJ and SJ tasks as a way of minimizing the confound from differences in unisensory processing.
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Affiliation(s)
- Alexandra N Scurry
- Department of Psychology, University of Nevada, 1664 N. Virginia St., Reno, NV 89557, USA.
| | - Zachary Lovelady
- Department of Psychology, University of Nevada, 1664 N. Virginia St., Reno, NV 89557, USA
| | - Fang Jiang
- Department of Psychology, University of Nevada, 1664 N. Virginia St., Reno, NV 89557, USA
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22
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Mehrabi S, Muñoz JE, Basharat A, Boger J, Cao S, Barnett-Cowan M, Middleton LE. Immersive virtual reality exergames to promote well-being of community-dwelling older adults: a mixed-methods pilot study protocol (Preprint). JMIR Res Protoc 2021; 11:e32955. [PMID: 35700014 PMCID: PMC9237784 DOI: 10.2196/32955] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/16/2021] [Revised: 02/21/2022] [Accepted: 04/21/2022] [Indexed: 01/26/2023] Open
Abstract
Background Despite the proven benefits of exercise in older adults, challenges such as access and motivation can deter their engagement. Interactive virtual reality (VR) games combined with exercise (exergames) are a plausible strategy to encourage physical activity among this population. However, there has been little research on the feasibility, acceptability, and potential benefits of deploying at-home VR exergames among community-dwelling older adults. Objective The objectives of this study are to estimate the feasibility, usability, and acceptability of a co-designed VR exergame in community-dwelling older adults; examine intervention feasibility and assessment protocols for a future large-scale trial; and provide pilot data on outcomes of interest (physical activity, exercise self-efficacy, mood, cognition, perception, and gameplay metrics). Methods The study will be a remote, 6-week intervention comprising an experimental and a control group. A sample of at least 12 community-dwelling older adults (with no or mild cognitive impairment) will be recruited for each group. Both groups will follow the same study procedures and assessment methods. However, the experimental group will engage with a co-designed VR exergame (Seas The Day) thrice weekly for approximately 20 minutes using the Oculus Quest 2 (Facebook Reality Labs) VR headset. The control group will read (instead of playing Seas The Day) thrice weekly for approximately 20 minutes over the 6-week period. A mixed methods evaluation will be used. Changes in physical activity, exercise self-efficacy, mood, cognition, and perception will be compared before and after acute data as well as before and after the 6 weeks between the experimental (exergaming) and control (reading) groups. Qualitative data from postintervention focus groups or interviews and informal notes and reports from all participants will be analyzed to assess the feasibility of the study protocol. Qualitative data from the experimental group will also be analyzed to assess the feasibility, usability, and acceptability of at-home VR exergames and explore perceived facilitators of and barriers to uptaking VR systems among community-dwelling older adults. Results The screening and recruitment process for the experimental group started in May 2021, and the data collection process will be completed by September 2021. The timeline of the recruitment process for the control group is September 2021 to December 2021. We anticipate an estimated adherence rate of ≥80%. Challenges associated with VR technology and the complexity of remote assessments are expected. Conclusions This pilot study will provide important information on the feasibility, acceptability, and usability of a custom-made VR exergaming intervention to promote older adults’ well-being. Findings from this study will be useful to inform the methodology, design, study procedures, and assessment protocol for future large-scale trials of VR exergames with older adults as well as deepen the understanding of remote deployment and at-home use of VR for exercise in older adults. International Registered Report Identifier (IRRID) DERR1-10.2196/32955
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Affiliation(s)
- Samira Mehrabi
- Department of Kinesiology, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON, Canada
| | - John E Muñoz
- Department of Systems Design Engineering, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON, Canada
| | - Aysha Basharat
- Department of Kinesiology, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON, Canada
| | - Jennifer Boger
- Department of Systems Design Engineering, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON, Canada
- Research Institute for Aging, Waterloo, ON, Canada
| | - Shi Cao
- Department of Systems Design Engineering, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON, Canada
| | | | - Laura E Middleton
- Department of Kinesiology, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON, Canada
- Research Institute for Aging, Waterloo, ON, Canada
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Bak K, Chan GSW, Schutz M, Campos JL. Perceptions of Audio-Visual Impact Events in Younger and Older Adults. Multisens Res 2021; 34:1-30. [PMID: 34298502 DOI: 10.1163/22134808-bja10056] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/23/2020] [Accepted: 06/17/2021] [Indexed: 11/19/2022]
Abstract
Previous studies have examined whether audio-visual integration changes in older age, with some studies reporting age-related differences and others reporting no differences. Most studies have either used very basic and ambiguous stimuli (e.g., flash/beep) or highly contextualized, causally related stimuli (e.g., speech). However, few have used tasks that fall somewhere between the extremes of this continuum, such as those that include contextualized, causally related stimuli that are not speech-based; for example, audio-visual impact events. The present study used a paradigm requiring duration estimates and temporal order judgements (TOJ) of audio-visual impact events. Specifically, the Schutz-Lipscomb illusion, in which the perceived duration of a percussive tone is influenced by the length of the visual striking gesture, was examined in younger and older adults. Twenty-one younger and 21 older adult participants were presented with a visual point-light representation of a percussive impact event (i.e., a marimbist striking their instrument with a long or short gesture) combined with a percussive auditory tone. Participants completed a tone duration judgement task and a TOJ task. Five audio-visual temporal offsets (-400 to +400 ms) and five spatial offsets (from -90 to +90°) were randomly introduced. Results demonstrated that the strength of the illusion did not differ between older and younger adults and was not influenced by spatial or temporal offsets. Older adults showed an 'auditory first bias' when making TOJs. The current findings expand what is known about age-related differences in audio-visual integration by considering them in the context of impact-related events.
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Affiliation(s)
- Katherine Bak
- Department of Psychology, University of Toronto, 27 King's College Circle, Toronto, ON, Canada, M5S 1A1
- The KITE Research Institute-University Health Network, 550 University Avenue, Toronto, ON, Canada, M5G 2A2
| | - George S W Chan
- The KITE Research Institute-University Health Network, 550 University Avenue, Toronto, ON, Canada, M5G 2A2
| | - Michael Schutz
- School of the Arts, McMaster University, 1280 Main Street West, Hamilton, ON, Canada, L8S 4L8
- Department of Psychology, Neuroscience, and Behaviour, McMaster University, 1280 Main Street West, Hamilton, ON, Canada, L8S 4L8
| | - Jennifer L Campos
- Department of Psychology, University of Toronto, 27 King's College Circle, Toronto, ON, Canada, M5S 1A1
- The KITE Research Institute-University Health Network, 550 University Avenue, Toronto, ON, Canada, M5G 2A2
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Guyon M, Chea C, Laroche D, Fournel I, Baudet A, Toupet M, Bozorg Grayeli A. Measuring threshold and latency of motion perception on a swinging bed. PLoS One 2021; 16:e0252914. [PMID: 34242212 PMCID: PMC8270192 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0252914] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/04/2020] [Accepted: 05/26/2021] [Indexed: 11/19/2022] Open
Abstract
INTRODUCTION Our objective was to develop and to evaluate a system to measure latency and threshold of pendular motion perception based on a swinging bed. MATERIALS AND METHODS This prospective study included 30 healthy adults (age: 32 ± 12 years). All subjects were tested twice with a 10 min. interval. A second trial was conducted 2 to 15 days after. A rehabilitation swinging bed was connected to an electronic device emitting a beep at the beginning of each oscillation phase with an adjustable time lag. Subjects were blindfolded and auditory cues other than the beep were minimized. The acceleration threshold was measured by letting the bed oscillate freely until a natural break and asking the patient when he did not perceive any motion. The perception latency was determined by asking the patient to indicate whether the beep and the peak of each oscillation were synchronous. The time lag between sound and peak of the head position was swept from -750 to +750 ms by 50 ms increments. RESULTS The mean acceleration threshold was 9.2±4.60 cm/s2. The range width of the synchronous perception interval was estimated as 535±190 ms. The point of subjective synchronicity defined as the center of this interval was -195±106 ms (n = 30). The test-retest evaluation in the same trial showed an acceptable reproducibility for the acceleration threshold and good to excellent for all parameters related to sound-movement latency. CONCLUSION Swinging bed combined to sound stimulation can provide reproducible information on movement perception in a simple and non-invasive manner with highly reproducible results.
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Affiliation(s)
- Maxime Guyon
- Otolaryngology Department, Dijon University Hospital, Dijon, France
| | - Cyrielle Chea
- Otolaryngology Department, Dijon University Hospital, Dijon, France
| | - Davy Laroche
- INSERM CIC 1432, Plateforme d’Investigation Technologique, Dijon University Hospital, Dijon, France
- INSERM UMR1093, Cognition, Action et Plasticité Sensorimotrice, Université de Bourgogne Franche Comté, Dijon, France
| | - Isabelle Fournel
- INSERM CIC 1432, Module Epidémiologie Clinique/Essais Cliniques, Dijon, France
| | - Audrey Baudet
- INSERM CIC 1432, Plateforme d’Investigation Technologique, Dijon University Hospital, Dijon, France
| | - Michel Toupet
- Otolaryngology Department, Dijon University Hospital, Dijon, France
- Centre d’Explorations Fonctionnelles Otoneurologiques, Paris, France
| | - Alexis Bozorg Grayeli
- Otolaryngology Department, Dijon University Hospital, Dijon, France
- CNRS UMR 6306, Le2i Research Laboratory, Dijon, France
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Chen YC, Yeh SL, Tang PF. Age-Related Changes in Audiovisual Simultaneity Perception and Their Relationship With Working Memory. J Gerontol B Psychol Sci Soc Sci 2021; 76:1095-1103. [PMID: 32860498 DOI: 10.1093/geronb/gbaa137] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/23/2020] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
OBJECTIVES Perceiving simultaneity of a visual and an auditory signal is critical for humans to integrate these multisensory inputs effectively and respond properly. We examined age-related changes in audiovisual simultaneity perception, and the relationships between this perception and working memory performances with aging. METHODS Audiovisual simultaneity perception of young, middle-aged, and older adults was measured using a simultaneity judgment (SJ) task, in which a flash and a beep were presented at 1 of 11 stimulus-onset asynchronies (SOAs). Participants judged whether these two stimuli were perceived simultaneously. Precision of simultaneity perception, the SOA corresponding to the point of subjective simultaneity (PSS), and response errors at each SOA were estimated using model fitting. The precision and PSS are associated with multisensory perception per se, whereas the response error reflects executive ability when performing the SJ task. Visual working memory of the same middle-aged and older adults was measured using the Cambridge Neuropsychological Test Automated Battery (CANTAB) beforehand. RESULTS Compared to young adults' performances, middle-aged and older adults showed a decreased precision, a shift of PSS toward the visual-leading SOAs, and increased response errors at the visual-leading SOAs. Among these changes, only the increased response errors correlated with worse spatial recognition memory in middle-aged and older adults. DISCUSSION Age-related decrements in audiovisual simultaneity perception start from middle age and are manifested in both perceptual and executive parameters. Furthermore, higher-order executive ability is plausibly a common cause for age-related degenerations in the audiovisual simultaneity perception and visual working memory.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yi-Chuan Chen
- Department of Medicine, Mackay Medical College, New Taipei City, Taiwan
| | - Su-Ling Yeh
- Department of Psychology, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan.,Center for Artificial Intelligence and Robotics, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan
| | - Pei-Fang Tang
- School and Graduate Institute of Physical Therapy, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan.,Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, National Taiwan University Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan
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26
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Pinto JO, Vieira De Melo BB, Dores AR, Peixoto B, Geraldo A, Barbosa F. Narrative review of the multisensory integration tasks used with older adults: inclusion of multisensory integration tasks into neuropsychological assessment. Expert Rev Neurother 2021; 21:657-674. [PMID: 33890537 DOI: 10.1080/14737175.2021.1914592] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 01/05/2023]
Abstract
Introduction: Age-related changes in sensory functioning impact the activities of daily living and interact with cognitive decline. Given the interactions between sensory and cognitive functioning, combining multisensory integration (MI) assessment with the neuropsychological assessment of older adults seems promising. This review aims to examine the characteristics and utility of MI tasks in functional and cognitive assessment of older adults, with or without neurocognitive impairment.Areas covered: A literature search was conducted following the quality assessment of narrative review criteria. Results focused on tasks of detection, discrimination, sensory illusion, temporal judgment, and sensory conflict. Studies were not consensual regarding the enhancement of MI with age, but most studies showed that older adults had an expanded time window of integration. In older adults with mild cognitive impairment or major neurocognitive disorder it was a mediating role of the magnitude of visual-somatosensory integration between neurocognitive impairment and spatial aspects of gait.Expert opinion: Recently, some concerns have been raised about how to maximize the ecological validity of the neuropsychological assessment. Since most of our activities of daily living are multisensory and older adults benefit from multisensory information, MI assessment has the potential to improve the ecological validity of the neuropsychological assessment.
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Affiliation(s)
- Joana O Pinto
- Faculty of Psychology and Education Sciences, University of Porto, Porto, Portugal.,Human and Social Sciences Department, School of Health, Polytechnic Institute of Porto, Porto, Portugal.,CESPU, University Institute of Health Sciences, Gandra, Portugal
| | - Bruno B Vieira De Melo
- Psychosocial Rehabilitation Laboratory, Center for Rehabilitation Research, School of Health of the Polytechnic of Porto, Porto, Portugal
| | - Artemisa R Dores
- Faculty of Psychology and Education Sciences, University of Porto, Porto, Portugal.,Human and Social Sciences Department, School of Health, Polytechnic Institute of Porto, Porto, Portugal.,Psychosocial Rehabilitation Laboratory, Center for Rehabilitation Research, School of Health of the Polytechnic of Porto, Porto, Portugal
| | - Bruno Peixoto
- CESPU, University Institute of Health Sciences, Gandra, Portugal.,NeuroGen - Center for Health Technology and Services Research (CINTESIS), Porto, Portugal
| | - Andreia Geraldo
- Faculty of Psychology and Education Sciences, University of Porto, Porto, Portugal
| | - Fernando Barbosa
- Faculty of Psychology and Education Sciences, University of Porto, Porto, Portugal
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Park H, Nannt J, Kayser C. Sensory- and memory-related drivers for altered ventriloquism effects and aftereffects in older adults. Cortex 2021; 135:298-310. [PMID: 33422888 PMCID: PMC7856550 DOI: 10.1016/j.cortex.2020.12.001] [Citation(s) in RCA: 11] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/22/2020] [Revised: 10/21/2020] [Accepted: 12/03/2020] [Indexed: 01/05/2023]
Abstract
The manner in which humans exploit multisensory information for subsequent decisions changes with age. Multiple causes for such age-effects are being discussed, including a reduced precision in peripheral sensory representations, changes in cognitive inference about causal relations between sensory cues, and a decline in memory contributing to altered sequential patterns of multisensory behaviour. To dissociate these putative contributions, we investigated how healthy young and older adults integrate audio-visual spatial information within trials (the ventriloquism effect) and between trials (the ventriloquism aftereffect). With both a model-free and (Bayesian) model-based analyses we found that both biases differed between groups. Our results attribute the age-change in the ventriloquism bias to a decline in spatial hearing rather than a change in cognitive processes. This decline in peripheral function, combined with a more prominent influence from preceding responses rather than preceding stimuli in the elderly, can also explain the observed age-effect in the ventriloquism aftereffect. Our results suggest a transition from a sensory-to a behavior-driven influence of past multisensory experience on perceptual decisions with age, due to reduced sensory precision and change in memory capacity.
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Affiliation(s)
- Hame Park
- Department for Cognitive Neuroscience, Faculty of Biology, Bielefeld University, Bielefeld, Germany; Center for Cognitive Interaction Technology (CITEC), Bielefeld University, Bielefeld, Germany.
| | - Julia Nannt
- Department for Cognitive Neuroscience, Faculty of Biology, Bielefeld University, Bielefeld, Germany; Center for Cognitive Interaction Technology (CITEC), Bielefeld University, Bielefeld, Germany
| | - Christoph Kayser
- Department for Cognitive Neuroscience, Faculty of Biology, Bielefeld University, Bielefeld, Germany; Center for Cognitive Interaction Technology (CITEC), Bielefeld University, Bielefeld, Germany.
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28
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O'Brien JM, Chan JS, Setti A. Audio-Visual Training in Older Adults: 2-Interval-Forced Choice Task Improves Performance. Front Neurosci 2020; 14:569212. [PMID: 33304234 PMCID: PMC7693639 DOI: 10.3389/fnins.2020.569212] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/03/2020] [Accepted: 10/08/2020] [Indexed: 12/12/2022] Open
Abstract
A growing interest in ameliorating multisensory perception deficits in older adults arises from recent evidence showing that impaired multisensory processing, particularly in the temporal domain, may be associated with cognitive and functional impairments. Perceptual training has proved successful in improving multisensory temporal processing in young adults, but few studies have investigated this training approach in older adults. In the present study we used a simultaneity (or synchronicity) judgement task with feedback, to train the audio-visual abilities of community-dwelling, cognitively healthy older adults. We recruited 23 older adults (M = 74.17, SD = 6.23) and a group of 20 young adults (M = 24.20, SD = 4.23) who served as a comparison. Participants were tested before and after perceptual training using a 2-Interval Forced Choice Task (2-IFC); and the Sound-Induced Flash Illusion (SIFI). After 3 days of training, participants improved on the 2-IFC task, with a significant narrowing of the temporal window of integration (TWI) found for both groups. Generalization of training effects was not found, with no post-training differences in perceptual sensitivity to the SIFI for either group. These findings provide evidence perceptual narrowing can be achieved in older as well as younger adults after 3 days of perceptual training. These results provide useful information for future studies attempting to improve audio-visual temporal discrimination abilities in older people.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jessica M O'Brien
- School of Applied Psychology, University College Cork, Cork, Ireland
| | - Jason S Chan
- School of Applied Psychology, University College Cork, Cork, Ireland
| | - Annalisa Setti
- School of Applied Psychology, University College Cork, Cork, Ireland
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29
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Ren Y, Guo A, Xu Z, Wang T, Wu R, Yang W. Age-related functional brain connectivity during audio-visual hand-held tool recognition. Brain Behav 2020; 10:e01759. [PMID: 32683799 PMCID: PMC7507049 DOI: 10.1002/brb3.1759] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/20/2020] [Revised: 07/01/2020] [Accepted: 07/02/2020] [Indexed: 11/26/2022] Open
Abstract
INTRODUCTION Previous studies have confirmed increased functional connectivity in elderly adults during processing of simple audio-visual stimuli; however, it is unclear whether elderly adults maximize their performance by strengthening their functional brain connectivity when processing dynamic audio-visual hand-held tool stimuli. The present study aimed to explore this question using global functional connectivity. METHODS Twenty-one healthy elderly adults and 21 healthy younger adults were recruited to conduct a dynamic hand-held tool recognition task with high/low-intensity stimuli. RESULTS Elderly adults exhibited higher areas under the curve for both the high-intensity (3.5 versus. 2.7) and low-intensity (3.0 versus. 1.2) stimuli, indicating a higher audio-visual integration ability, but a delayed and widened audio-visual integration window for elderly adults for both the high-intensity (390 - 690 ms versus. 360 - 560 ms) and low-intensity (460 - 690 ms versus. 430 - 500 ms) stimuli. Additionally, elderly adults exhibited higher theta-band (all p < .01) but lower alpha-, beta-, and gamma-band functional connectivity (all p < .05) than younger adults under both the high- and low-intensity-stimulus conditions when processing audio-visual stimuli, except for gamma-band functional connectivity under the high-intensity-stimulus condition. Furthermore, higher theta- and alpha-band functional connectivity were observed for the audio-visual stimuli than for the auditory and visual stimuli and under the high-intensity-stimulus condition than under the low-intensity-stimulus condition. CONCLUSION The higher theta-band functional connectivity in elderly adults was mainly due to higher attention allocation. The results further suggested that in the case of sensory processing, theta, alpha, beta, and gamma activity might participate in different stages of perception.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yanna Ren
- Department of Psychology, College of Humanities and Management, Guizhou University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Guiyang, China
| | - Ao Guo
- Department of Psychology, Faculty of Education, Hubei University, Wuhan, China
| | - Zhihan Xu
- Department of Foreign Language, Ningbo University of Technology, Zhejiang, China
| | - Tao Wang
- Department of Light and Chemical Engineering, Guizhou Light Industry Technical College, Guiyang, China
| | - Rui Wu
- Department of Psychology, College of Humanities and Management, Guizhou University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Guiyang, China
| | - Weiping Yang
- Department of Psychology, Faculty of Education, Hubei University, Wuhan, China
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30
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Michaelis K, Erickson LC, Fama ME, Skipper-Kallal LM, Xing S, Lacey EH, Anbari Z, Norato G, Rauschecker JP, Turkeltaub PE. Effects of age and left hemisphere lesions on audiovisual integration of speech. BRAIN AND LANGUAGE 2020; 206:104812. [PMID: 32447050 PMCID: PMC7379161 DOI: 10.1016/j.bandl.2020.104812] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/21/2019] [Revised: 04/02/2020] [Accepted: 05/04/2020] [Indexed: 06/11/2023]
Abstract
Neuroimaging studies have implicated left temporal lobe regions in audiovisual integration of speech and inferior parietal regions in temporal binding of incoming signals. However, it remains unclear which regions are necessary for audiovisual integration, especially when the auditory and visual signals are offset in time. Aging also influences integration, but the nature of this influence is unresolved. We used a McGurk task to test audiovisual integration and sensitivity to the timing of audiovisual signals in two older adult groups: left hemisphere stroke survivors and controls. We observed a positive relationship between age and audiovisual speech integration in both groups, and an interaction indicating that lesions reduce sensitivity to timing offsets between signals. Lesion-symptom mapping demonstrated that damage to the left supramarginal gyrus and planum temporale reduces temporal acuity in audiovisual speech perception. This suggests that a process mediated by these structures identifies asynchronous audiovisual signals that should not be integrated.
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Affiliation(s)
- Kelly Michaelis
- Neurology Department and Center for Brain Plasticity and Recovery, Georgetown University Medical Center, Washington DC, USA
| | - Laura C Erickson
- Neurology Department and Center for Brain Plasticity and Recovery, Georgetown University Medical Center, Washington DC, USA; Neuroscience Department, Georgetown University Medical Center, Washington DC, USA
| | - Mackenzie E Fama
- Neurology Department and Center for Brain Plasticity and Recovery, Georgetown University Medical Center, Washington DC, USA; Department of Speech-Language Pathology & Audiology, Towson University, Towson, MD, USA
| | - Laura M Skipper-Kallal
- Neurology Department and Center for Brain Plasticity and Recovery, Georgetown University Medical Center, Washington DC, USA
| | - Shihui Xing
- Neurology Department and Center for Brain Plasticity and Recovery, Georgetown University Medical Center, Washington DC, USA; Department of Neurology, First Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-Sen University, Guangzhou, China
| | - Elizabeth H Lacey
- Neurology Department and Center for Brain Plasticity and Recovery, Georgetown University Medical Center, Washington DC, USA; Research Division, MedStar National Rehabilitation Hospital, Washington DC, USA
| | - Zainab Anbari
- Neurology Department and Center for Brain Plasticity and Recovery, Georgetown University Medical Center, Washington DC, USA
| | - Gina Norato
- Clinical Trials Unit, National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA
| | - Josef P Rauschecker
- Neuroscience Department, Georgetown University Medical Center, Washington DC, USA
| | - Peter E Turkeltaub
- Neurology Department and Center for Brain Plasticity and Recovery, Georgetown University Medical Center, Washington DC, USA; Research Division, MedStar National Rehabilitation Hospital, Washington DC, USA.
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31
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Meilleur A, Foster NEV, Coll SM, Brambati SM, Hyde KL. Unisensory and multisensory temporal processing in autism and dyslexia: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Neurosci Biobehav Rev 2020; 116:44-63. [PMID: 32544540 DOI: 10.1016/j.neubiorev.2020.06.013] [Citation(s) in RCA: 34] [Impact Index Per Article: 8.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/28/2019] [Revised: 06/01/2020] [Accepted: 06/08/2020] [Indexed: 12/28/2022]
Abstract
This study presents a comprehensive systematic review and meta-analysis of temporal processing in autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and developmental dyslexia (DD), two neurodevelopmental disorders in which temporal processing deficits have been highly researched. The results provide strong evidence for impairments in temporal processing in both ASD (g = 0.48) and DD (g = 0.82), as measured by judgments of temporal order and simultaneity. In individual analyses, multisensory temporal processing was impaired for both ASD and DD, and unisensory auditory, visual and tactile processing were all impaired in DD. In ASD, speech stimuli showed moderate impairment effect sizes, whereas nonspeech stimuli showed small effects. Greater reading and spelling skills in DD were associated with greater temporal precision. Temporal deficits did not show changes with age in either disorder. In addition to more clearly defining temporal impairments in ASD and DD, the results highlight common and distinct patterns of temporal processing between these disorders. Deficits are discussed in relation to existing theoretical models, and recommendations are made for future research.
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Affiliation(s)
- Alexa Meilleur
- International Laboratory for Brain, Music and Sound Research (BRAMS), Department of Psychology, University of Montreal, Marie-Victorin Building, 90 Avenue Vincent D'Indy, Montréal, QC, H2V 2S9, Canada; Department of Psychology, University of Montréal, Marie-Victorin Building, 90 avenue Vincent-d'Indy, Suite D-418, Montréal, QC, H3C 3J7, Canada; Centre for Research on Brain, Language and Music, Faculty of Medicine, McGill University, Rabinovitch house, 3640 de la Montagne, Montréal, QC, H3G 2A8, Canada.
| | - Nicholas E V Foster
- International Laboratory for Brain, Music and Sound Research (BRAMS), Department of Psychology, University of Montreal, Marie-Victorin Building, 90 Avenue Vincent D'Indy, Montréal, QC, H2V 2S9, Canada; Department of Psychology, University of Montréal, Marie-Victorin Building, 90 avenue Vincent-d'Indy, Suite D-418, Montréal, QC, H3C 3J7, Canada; Centre for Research on Brain, Language and Music, Faculty of Medicine, McGill University, Rabinovitch house, 3640 de la Montagne, Montréal, QC, H3G 2A8, Canada
| | - Sarah-Maude Coll
- International Laboratory for Brain, Music and Sound Research (BRAMS), Department of Psychology, University of Montreal, Marie-Victorin Building, 90 Avenue Vincent D'Indy, Montréal, QC, H2V 2S9, Canada; Department of Psychology, University of Montréal, Marie-Victorin Building, 90 avenue Vincent-d'Indy, Suite D-418, Montréal, QC, H3C 3J7, Canada; Centre for Research on Brain, Language and Music, Faculty of Medicine, McGill University, Rabinovitch house, 3640 de la Montagne, Montréal, QC, H3G 2A8, Canada
| | - Simona M Brambati
- Department of Psychology, University of Montréal, Marie-Victorin Building, 90 avenue Vincent-d'Indy, Suite D-418, Montréal, QC, H3C 3J7, Canada; Centre for Research on Brain, Language and Music, Faculty of Medicine, McGill University, Rabinovitch house, 3640 de la Montagne, Montréal, QC, H3G 2A8, Canada; Centre de Recherche de l'Institut Universitaire de Gériatrie de Montréal, 4545 Chemin Queen Mary, Montréal, QC, H3W 1W4, Canada
| | - Krista L Hyde
- International Laboratory for Brain, Music and Sound Research (BRAMS), Department of Psychology, University of Montreal, Marie-Victorin Building, 90 Avenue Vincent D'Indy, Montréal, QC, H2V 2S9, Canada; Department of Psychology, University of Montréal, Marie-Victorin Building, 90 avenue Vincent-d'Indy, Suite D-418, Montréal, QC, H3C 3J7, Canada; Centre for Research on Brain, Language and Music, Faculty of Medicine, McGill University, Rabinovitch house, 3640 de la Montagne, Montréal, QC, H3G 2A8, Canada
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32
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Contingency awareness, aging, and the parietal lobe. Neurobiol Aging 2020; 91:125-135. [PMID: 32241582 DOI: 10.1016/j.neurobiolaging.2020.02.024] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/12/2019] [Revised: 02/21/2020] [Accepted: 02/22/2020] [Indexed: 11/20/2022]
Abstract
Contingency awareness is thought to rely on an intact medial temporal lobe and also appears to be a function of age, as older subjects tend to be less aware. The current investigation used functional magnetic resonance imaging, transcranial direct current stimulation, and eyeblink classical conditioning to study brain processes related to contingency awareness as a function of age. Older adults were significantly less aware of the relationship between the tone-airpuff pairings than younger adults. Greater right parietal functional magnetic resonance imaging activation was associated with higher levels of contingency awareness for younger and older subjects. Cathodal transcranial direct current stimulation over the right parietal lobe led to lower levels of awareness in younger subjects without disrupting conditioned responses. Older adults exhibited hyperactivations in the parietal and medial temporal lobes, despite showing no conditioning deficits. These findings strongly support the idea that the parietal cortex serves as a substrate for contingency awareness and that age-related disruption of this region is sufficient to impair awareness, which may be a manifestation of some form of naturally occurring age-related neglect.
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Zhou HY, Cheung EFC, Chan RCK. Audiovisual temporal integration: Cognitive processing, neural mechanisms, developmental trajectory and potential interventions. Neuropsychologia 2020; 140:107396. [PMID: 32087206 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2020.107396] [Citation(s) in RCA: 38] [Impact Index Per Article: 9.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/17/2019] [Revised: 02/14/2020] [Accepted: 02/15/2020] [Indexed: 12/21/2022]
Abstract
To integrate auditory and visual signals into a unified percept, the paired stimuli must co-occur within a limited time window known as the Temporal Binding Window (TBW). The width of the TBW, a proxy of audiovisual temporal integration ability, has been found to be correlated with higher-order cognitive and social functions. A comprehensive review of studies investigating audiovisual TBW reveals several findings: (1) a wide range of top-down processes and bottom-up features can modulate the width of the TBW, facilitating adaptation to the changing and multisensory external environment; (2) a large-scale brain network works in coordination to ensure successful detection of audiovisual (a)synchrony; (3) developmentally, audiovisual TBW follows a U-shaped pattern across the lifespan, with a protracted developmental course into late adolescence and rebounding in size again in late life; (4) an enlarged TBW is characteristic of a number of neurodevelopmental disorders; and (5) the TBW is highly flexible via perceptual and musical training. Interventions targeting the TBW may be able to improve multisensory function and ameliorate social communicative symptoms in clinical populations.
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Affiliation(s)
- Han-Yu Zhou
- Neuropsychology and Applied Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory, CAS Key Laboratory of Mental Health, Institute of Psychology, Beijing, China; Department of Psychology, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China
| | | | - Raymond C K Chan
- Neuropsychology and Applied Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory, CAS Key Laboratory of Mental Health, Institute of Psychology, Beijing, China; Department of Psychology, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China.
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Wallace MT, Woynaroski TG, Stevenson RA. Multisensory Integration as a Window into Orderly and Disrupted Cognition and Communication. Annu Rev Psychol 2020; 71:193-219. [DOI: 10.1146/annurev-psych-010419-051112] [Citation(s) in RCA: 37] [Impact Index Per Article: 9.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/09/2022]
Abstract
During our everyday lives, we are confronted with a vast amount of information from several sensory modalities. This multisensory information needs to be appropriately integrated for us to effectively engage with and learn from our world. Research carried out over the last half century has provided new insights into the way such multisensory processing improves human performance and perception; the neurophysiological foundations of multisensory function; the time course for its development; how multisensory abilities differ in clinical populations; and, most recently, the links between multisensory processing and cognitive abilities. This review summarizes the extant literature on multisensory function in typical and atypical circumstances, discusses the implications of the work carried out to date for theory and research, and points toward next steps for advancing the field.
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Affiliation(s)
- Mark T. Wallace
- Department of Hearing and Speech Sciences, Vanderbilt University Medical Center, Nashville, Tennessee 37232, USA;,
- Departments of Psychology and Pharmacology, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, Tennessee 37232, USA
- Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Vanderbilt University Medical Center, Nashville, Tennessee 37232, USA
- Vanderbilt Brain Institute, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, Tennessee 37232, USA
- Vanderbilt Kennedy Center, Nashville, Tennessee 37203, USA
| | - Tiffany G. Woynaroski
- Department of Hearing and Speech Sciences, Vanderbilt University Medical Center, Nashville, Tennessee 37232, USA;,
- Vanderbilt Brain Institute, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, Tennessee 37232, USA
- Vanderbilt Kennedy Center, Nashville, Tennessee 37203, USA
| | - Ryan A. Stevenson
- Departments of Psychology and Psychiatry and Program in Neuroscience, University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario N6A 3K7, Canada
- Brain and Mind Institute, University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario N6A 3K7, Canada
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Scurry AN, Vercillo T, Nicholson A, Webster M, Jiang F. Aging Impairs Temporal Sensitivity, but not Perceptual Synchrony, Across Modalities. Multisens Res 2019; 32:671-692. [PMID: 31059487 DOI: 10.1163/22134808-20191343] [Citation(s) in RCA: 7] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/30/2018] [Accepted: 02/11/2019] [Indexed: 11/19/2022]
Abstract
Encoding the temporal properties of external signals that comprise multimodal events is a major factor guiding everyday experience. However, during the natural aging process, impairments to sensory processing can profoundly affect multimodal temporal perception. Various mechanisms can contribute to temporal perception, and thus it is imperative to understand how each can be affected by age. In the current study, using three different temporal order judgement tasks (unisensory, multisensory, and sensorimotor), we investigated the effects of age on two separate temporal processes: synchronization and integration of multiple signals. These two processes rely on different aspects of temporal information, either the temporal alignment of processed signals or the integration/segregation of signals arising from different modalities, respectively. Results showed that the ability to integrate/segregate multiple signals decreased with age regardless of the task, and that the magnitude of such impairment correlated across tasks, suggesting a widespread mechanism affected by age. In contrast, perceptual synchrony remained stable with age, revealing a distinct intact mechanism. Overall, results from this study suggest that aging has differential effects on temporal processing, and general impairments with aging may impact global temporal sensitivity while context-dependent processes remain unaffected.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Tiziana Vercillo
- 2Ernest J. Del Monte Institute for Neuroscience, Department of Neuroscience, University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry, Rochester, NY 14642, USA
| | - Alexis Nicholson
- 1Department of Psychology, University of Nevada, Reno, NV 89557, USA
| | - Michael Webster
- 1Department of Psychology, University of Nevada, Reno, NV 89557, USA
| | - Fang Jiang
- 1Department of Psychology, University of Nevada, Reno, NV 89557, USA
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36
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Basharat A, Mahoney JR, Barnett-Cowan M. Temporal Metrics of Multisensory Processing Change in the Elderly. Multisens Res 2019; 32:715-744. [DOI: 10.1163/22134808-20191458] [Citation(s) in RCA: 11] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/01/2019] [Accepted: 07/12/2019] [Indexed: 11/19/2022]
Abstract
Abstract
Older adults exhibit greater multisensory response time (RT) facilitation by violating the race model more than young adults; this is commonly interpreted as an enhancement in perception. Older adults typically exhibit wider temporal binding windows (TBWs) and points of subjective simultaneity (PSS) that typically lie farther from true simultaneity as compared to young adults when simultaneity judgment (SJ) and temporal-order judgment (TOJ) tasks are utilized; this is commonly interpreted as an impairment in perception. Here we explore the relation between the three tasks in order to better assess audiovisual multisensory temporal processing in both young and older adults. Our results confirm previous reports showing that audiovisual RT, TBWs and PSSs change with age; however, we show for the first time a significant positive relation between the magnitude of race model violation in young adults as a function of the PSS obtained from the audiovisual TOJ task (r: 0.49, p: 0.007), that is absent in older adults (r: 0.13, p: 0.58). Furthermore, we find no evidence for the relation between race model violation as a function of the PSS obtained from the audiovisual SJ task in both young (r: −0.01, p: 0.94) and older adults (r: 0.1, p: 0.66). Our results confirm previous reports that (i) audiovisual temporal processing changes with age; (ii) distinct processes are likely involved in simultaneity and temporal-order perception; and (iii) common processing between race model violation and temporal-order judgment is impaired in the elderly.
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Affiliation(s)
- Aysha Basharat
- 1Department of Kinesiology, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON, Canada N2L 3G1
| | - Jeannette R. Mahoney
- 2The Department of Neurology, Division of Cognitive & Motor Aging, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Bronx, NY, USA
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37
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Hirst RJ, Kicks EC, Allen HA, Cragg L. Cross-modal interference-control is reduced in childhood but maintained in aging: A cohort study of stimulus- and response-interference in cross-modal and unimodal Stroop tasks. J Exp Psychol Hum Percept Perform 2019; 45:553-572. [PMID: 30945905 PMCID: PMC6484713 DOI: 10.1037/xhp0000608] [Citation(s) in RCA: 10] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/08/2022]
Abstract
Interference-control is the ability to exclude distractions and focus on a specific task or stimulus. However, it is currently unclear whether the same interference-control mechanisms underlie the ability to ignore unimodal and cross-modal distractions. In 2 experiments we assessed whether unimodal and cross-modal interference follow similar trajectories in development and aging and occur at similar processing levels. In Experiment 1, 42 children (6-11 years), 31 younger adults (18-25 years) and 32 older adults (60-84 years) identified color rectangles with either written (unimodal) or spoken (cross-modal) distractor-words. Stimuli could be congruent, incongruent but mapped to the same response (stimulus-incongruent), or incongruent and mapped to different responses (response-incongruent); thus, separating interference occurring at early (sensory) and late (response) processing levels. Unimodal interference was worst in childhood and old age; however, older adults maintained the ability to ignore cross-modal distraction. Unimodal but not cross-modal response-interference also reduced accuracy. In Experiment 2 we compared the effect of audition on vision and vice versa in 52 children (6-11 years), 30 young adults (22-33 years) and 30 older adults (60-84 years). As in Experiment 1, older adults maintained the ability to ignore cross-modal distraction arising from either modality, and neither type of cross-modal distraction limited accuracy in adults. However, cross-modal distraction still reduced accuracy in children and children were more slowed by stimulus-interference compared with adults. We conclude that; unimodal and cross-modal interference follow different life span trajectories and differences in stimulus- and response-interference may increase cross-modal distractibility in childhood. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Ella C Kicks
- School of Psychology and Neuroscience, University of St. Andrews
| | | | - Lucy Cragg
- School of Psychology, University of Nottingham
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38
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Sanders P, Thompson B, Corballis P, Searchfield G. On the Timing of Signals in Multisensory Integration and Crossmodal Interactions: a Scoping Review. Multisens Res 2019; 32:533-573. [PMID: 31137004 DOI: 10.1163/22134808-20191331] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/17/2018] [Accepted: 04/24/2019] [Indexed: 11/19/2022]
Abstract
A scoping review was undertaken to explore research investigating early interactions and integration of auditory and visual stimuli in the human brain. The focus was on methods used to study low-level multisensory temporal processing using simple stimuli in humans, and how this research has informed our understanding of multisensory perception. The study of multisensory temporal processing probes how the relative timing between signals affects perception. Several tasks, illusions, computational models, and neuroimaging techniques were identified in the literature search. Research into early audiovisual temporal processing in special populations was also reviewed. Recent research has continued to provide support for early integration of crossmodal information. These early interactions can influence higher-level factors, and vice versa. Temporal relationships between auditory and visual stimuli influence multisensory perception, and likely play a substantial role in solving the 'correspondence problem' (how the brain determines which sensory signals belong together, and which should be segregated).
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Affiliation(s)
- Philip Sanders
- 1Section of Audiology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand.,2Centre for Brain Research, University of Auckland, New Zealand.,3Brain Research New Zealand - Rangahau Roro Aotearoa, New Zealand
| | - Benjamin Thompson
- 2Centre for Brain Research, University of Auckland, New Zealand.,4School of Optometry and Vision Science, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand.,5School of Optometry and Vision Science, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Canada
| | - Paul Corballis
- 2Centre for Brain Research, University of Auckland, New Zealand.,6Department of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
| | - Grant Searchfield
- 1Section of Audiology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand.,2Centre for Brain Research, University of Auckland, New Zealand.,3Brain Research New Zealand - Rangahau Roro Aotearoa, New Zealand
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39
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Scurry AN, Dutcher D, Werner JS, Jiang F. Age-Related Effects on Cross-Modal Duration Perception. Multisens Res 2019; 32:693-714. [PMID: 31648201 DOI: 10.1163/22134808-20191461] [Citation(s) in RCA: 7] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/15/2019] [Accepted: 08/30/2019] [Indexed: 11/19/2022]
Abstract
Reliable duration perception of external events is necessary to coordinate perception with action, precisely discriminate speech, and for other daily functions. Visual duration perception can be heavily influenced by concurrent auditory signals; however, age-related effects on this process have received minimal attention. In the present study, we examined the effect of aging on duration perception by quantifying (1) duration discrimination thresholds, (2) auditory temporal dominance, and (3) visual duration expansion/compression percepts induced by an accompanying auditory stimulus of longer/shorter duration. Duration discrimination thresholds were significantly greater for visual than auditory tasks in both age groups, however there was no effect of age. While the auditory modality retained dominance in duration perception with age, older adults still performed worse than young adults when comparing durations of two target stimuli (e.g., visual) in the presence of distractors from the other modality (e.g., auditory). Finally, both age groups perceived similar visual duration compression, whereas older adults exhibited visual duration expansion over a wider range of auditory durations compared to their younger counterparts. Results are discussed in terms of multisensory integration and possible decision strategies that change with age.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Dustin Dutcher
- 1Department of Psychology, University of Nevada, Reno, NV 89557, USA
| | - John S Werner
- 2Department of Ophthalmology and Vision Science, University of California, Davis Medical Center, Sacramento, CA 95817, USA
| | - Fang Jiang
- 1Department of Psychology, University of Nevada, Reno, NV 89557, USA
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40
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Yang W, Guo A, Li Y, Qiu J, Li S, Yin S, Chen J, Ren Y. Audio-Visual Spatiotemporal Perceptual Training Enhances the P300 Component in Healthy Older Adults. Front Psychol 2018; 9:2537. [PMID: 30618958 PMCID: PMC6297778 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2018.02537] [Citation(s) in RCA: 9] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/14/2018] [Accepted: 11/28/2018] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
In older adults, cognitive abilities, such as those associated with vision and hearing, generally decrease with age. According to several studies, audio-visual perceptual training can improve perceived competence regarding visual and auditory stimuli, suggesting that perceptual training is effective and beneficial. However, whether audio-visual perceptual training can induce far-transfer effects in other forms of untrained cognitive processing that are not directly trained in older adults remains unclear. In this study, the classic P300 component, a neurophysiological indicator of cognitive processing of a stimulus, was selected as an evaluation index of the training effect. We trained both young and older adults on the ability to judge the temporal and spatial consistency of visual and auditory stimuli. P300 amplitudes were significantly greater in the posttraining session than in the pretraining session in older adults (P = 0.001). However, perceptual training had no significant effect (P = 0.949) on the P300 component in young adults. Our results illustrate that audio-visual perceptual training can lead to far-transfer effects in healthy older adults. These findings highlight the robust malleability of the aging brain, and further provide evidence to motivate exploration to improve cognitive abilities in older adults.
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Affiliation(s)
- Weiping Yang
- Department of Psychology, Faculty of Education, Hubei University, Wuhan, sChina.,Brain Cognition Research Center (BCRC), Faculty of Education, Hubei University, Wuhan, China
| | - Ao Guo
- Department of Psychology, Faculty of Education, Hubei University, Wuhan, sChina
| | - Yueying Li
- Department of Psychology, Faculty of Education, Hubei University, Wuhan, sChina
| | - Jiajing Qiu
- Department of Psychology, Faculty of Education, Hubei University, Wuhan, sChina
| | - Shengnan Li
- Department of Psychology, Faculty of Education, Hubei University, Wuhan, sChina
| | - Shufei Yin
- Department of Psychology, Faculty of Education, Hubei University, Wuhan, sChina
| | - Jianxin Chen
- Department of Psychology, Faculty of Education, Hubei University, Wuhan, sChina
| | - Yanna Ren
- Department of Psychology, Medical Humanities College, Guiyang College of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Guiyang, China
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41
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Schormans AL, Allman BL. Behavioral Plasticity of Audiovisual Perception: Rapid Recalibration of Temporal Sensitivity but Not Perceptual Binding Following Adult-Onset Hearing Loss. Front Behav Neurosci 2018; 12:256. [PMID: 30429780 PMCID: PMC6220077 DOI: 10.3389/fnbeh.2018.00256] [Citation(s) in RCA: 10] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/24/2018] [Accepted: 10/11/2018] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
The ability to accurately integrate or bind stimuli from more than one sensory modality is highly dependent on the features of the stimuli, such as their intensity and relative timing. Previous studies have demonstrated that the ability to perceptually bind stimuli is impaired in various clinical conditions such as autism, dyslexia, schizophrenia, as well as aging. However, it remains unknown if adult-onset hearing loss, separate from aging, influences audiovisual temporal acuity. In the present study, rats were trained using appetitive operant conditioning to perform an audiovisual temporal order judgment (TOJ) task or synchrony judgment (SJ) task in order to investigate the nature and extent that audiovisual temporal acuity is affected by adult-onset hearing loss, with a specific focus on the time-course of perceptual changes following loud noise exposure. In our first series of experiments, we found that audiovisual temporal acuity in normal-hearing rats was influenced by sound intensity, such that when a quieter sound was presented, the rats were biased to perceive the audiovisual stimuli as asynchronous (SJ task), or as though the visual stimulus was presented first (TOJ task). Psychophysical testing demonstrated that noise-induced hearing loss did not alter the rats' temporal sensitivity 2-3 weeks post-noise exposure, despite rats showing an initial difficulty in differentiating the temporal order of audiovisual stimuli. Furthermore, consistent with normal-hearing rats, the timing at which the stimuli were perceived as simultaneous (i.e., the point of subjective simultaneity, PSS) remained sensitive to sound intensity following hearing loss. Contrary to the TOJ task, hearing loss resulted in persistent impairments in asynchrony detection during the SJ task, such that a greater proportion of trials were now perceived as synchronous. Moreover, psychophysical testing found that noise-exposed rats had altered audiovisual synchrony perception, consistent with impaired audiovisual perceptual binding (e.g., an increase in the temporal window of integration on the right side of simultaneity; right temporal binding window (TBW)). Ultimately, our collective results show for the first time that adult-onset hearing loss leads to behavioral plasticity of audiovisual perception, characterized by a rapid recalibration of temporal sensitivity but a persistent impairment in the perceptual binding of audiovisual stimuli.
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Affiliation(s)
- Ashley L Schormans
- Department of Anatomy and Cell Biology, Schulich School of Medicine and Dentistry, University of Western Ontario, London, ON, Canada
| | - Brian L Allman
- Department of Anatomy and Cell Biology, Schulich School of Medicine and Dentistry, University of Western Ontario, London, ON, Canada
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42
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Paraskevoudi N, Balcı F, Vatakis A. "Walking" through the sensory, cognitive, and temporal degradations of healthy aging. Ann N Y Acad Sci 2018; 1426:72-92. [PMID: 29741265 DOI: 10.1111/nyas.13734] [Citation(s) in RCA: 48] [Impact Index Per Article: 8.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/22/2017] [Revised: 03/17/2018] [Accepted: 03/22/2018] [Indexed: 02/03/2023]
Abstract
As we age, there is a wide range of changes in motor, sensory, cognitive, and temporal processing due to alterations in the functioning of the central nervous and musculoskeletal systems. Specifically, aging is associated with degradations in gait; altered processing of the individual sensory systems; modifications in executive control, memory, and attention; and changes in temporal processing. These age-related alterations are often inter-related and have been suggested to result from shared neural substrates. Additionally, the overlap between these brain areas and those controlling walking raises the possibility of facilitating performance in several tasks by introducing protocols that can efficiently target all four domains. Attempts to counteract these negative effects of normal aging have been focusing on research to prevent falls and/or enhance cognitive processes, while ignoring the potential multisensory benefits accompanying old age. Research shows that the aging brain tends to increasingly rely on multisensory integration to compensate for degradations in individual sensory systems and for altered neural functioning. This review covers the age-related changes in the above-mentioned domains and the potential to exploit the benefits associated with multisensory integration in aging so as to improve one's mobility and enhance sensory, cognitive, and temporal processing.
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Affiliation(s)
- Nadia Paraskevoudi
- Multisensory and Temporal Processing Lab (MultiTimeLab), Department of History and Philosophy of Science, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Athens, Greece
| | - Fuat Balcı
- Department of Psychology, Koç University, Istanbul, Turkey
| | - Argiro Vatakis
- Multisensory and Temporal Processing Lab (MultiTimeLab), Department of History and Philosophy of Science, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Athens, Greece
- Cognitive Systems Research Institute, Athens, Greece
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43
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Brooks CJ, Chan YM, Anderson AJ, McKendrick AM. Audiovisual Temporal Perception in Aging: The Role of Multisensory Integration and Age-Related Sensory Loss. Front Hum Neurosci 2018; 12:192. [PMID: 29867415 PMCID: PMC5954093 DOI: 10.3389/fnhum.2018.00192] [Citation(s) in RCA: 18] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/27/2017] [Accepted: 04/20/2018] [Indexed: 11/26/2022] Open
Abstract
Within each sensory modality, age-related deficits in temporal perception contribute to the difficulties older adults experience when performing everyday tasks. Since perceptual experience is inherently multisensory, older adults also face the added challenge of appropriately integrating or segregating the auditory and visual cues present in our dynamic environment into coherent representations of distinct objects. As such, many studies have investigated how older adults perform when integrating temporal information across audition and vision. This review covers both direct judgments about temporal information (the sound-induced flash illusion, temporal order, perceived synchrony, and temporal rate discrimination) and judgments regarding stimuli containing temporal information (the audiovisual bounce effect and speech perception). Although an age-related increase in integration has been demonstrated on a variety of tasks, research specifically investigating the ability of older adults to integrate temporal auditory and visual cues has produced disparate results. In this short review, we explore what factors could underlie these divergent findings. We conclude that both task-specific differences and age-related sensory loss play a role in the reported disparity in age-related effects on the integration of auditory and visual temporal information.
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Affiliation(s)
- Cassandra J Brooks
- Department of Optometry and Vision Sciences, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne, VIC, Australia
| | - Yu Man Chan
- Department of Optometry and Vision Sciences, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne, VIC, Australia
| | - Andrew J Anderson
- Department of Optometry and Vision Sciences, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne, VIC, Australia
| | - Allison M McKendrick
- Department of Optometry and Vision Sciences, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne, VIC, Australia
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44
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Basharat A, Adams MS, Staines WR, Barnett-Cowan M. Simultaneity and Temporal Order Judgments Are Coded Differently and Change With Age: An Event-Related Potential Study. Front Integr Neurosci 2018; 12:15. [PMID: 29755327 PMCID: PMC5932149 DOI: 10.3389/fnint.2018.00015] [Citation(s) in RCA: 24] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/03/2017] [Accepted: 04/05/2018] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
Multisensory integration is required for a number of daily living tasks where the inability to accurately identify simultaneity and temporality of multisensory events results in errors in judgment leading to poor decision-making and dangerous behavior. Previously, our lab discovered that older adults exhibited impaired timing of audiovisual events, particularly when making temporal order judgments (TOJs). Simultaneity judgments (SJs), however, were preserved across the lifespan. Here, we investigate the difference between the TOJ and SJ tasks in younger and older adults to assess neural processing differences between these two tasks and across the lifespan. Event-related potentials (ERPs) were studied to determine between-task and between-age differences. Results revealed task specific differences in perceiving simultaneity and temporal order, suggesting that each task may be subserved via different neural mechanisms. Here, auditory N1 and visual P1 ERP amplitudes confirmed that unisensory processing of audiovisual stimuli did not differ between the two tasks within both younger and older groups, indicating that performance differences between tasks arise either from multisensory integration or higher-level decision-making. Compared to younger adults, older adults showed a sustained higher auditory N1 ERP amplitude response across SOAs, suggestive of broader response properties from an extended temporal binding window. Our work provides compelling evidence that different neural mechanisms subserve the SJ and TOJ tasks and that simultaneity and temporal order perception are coded differently and change with age.
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Affiliation(s)
- Aysha Basharat
- Department of Kinesiology, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON, Canada
| | - Meaghan S Adams
- Department of Kinesiology, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON, Canada
| | - William R Staines
- Department of Kinesiology, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON, Canada
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45
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Wise A, Barnett-Cowan M. Perceived Simultaneity and Temporal Order of Audiovisual Events Following Concussion. Front Hum Neurosci 2018; 12:139. [PMID: 29706877 PMCID: PMC5908974 DOI: 10.3389/fnhum.2018.00139] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/13/2018] [Accepted: 03/27/2018] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
The central nervous system allows for a limited time span referred to as the temporal binding window (TBW) in order to rapidly determine whether multisensory events correspond with the same event. Failure to correctly identify whether multisensory events occur simultaneously and their sequential order can lead to inaccurate representations of the physical world, poor decision-making and dangerous behavior. Damage to the neural systems that coordinate the relative timing of sensory events may explain some of the long-term consequences associated with concussion. The aim of this study was to investigate whether the perception of simultaneity and the discrimination of temporal order of audiovisual stimuli are impaired in those with a history of concussion. Fifty participants (17 with concussion history) were recruited to complete audiovisual simultaneity judgment (SJ) and temporal order judgment (TOJ) tasks. From these tasks, the TBW and point of subjective simultaneity (PSS) were extracted to assess whether the precision and or the accuracy of temporal perception changes with concussion, respectively. Results demonstrated that those with concussion history have a significantly wider TBW (less precise), with no significant change in the PSS (no change in accuracy), particularly for the TOJ task but no significant differences were found between the SJ and TOJ tasks. Importantly, a negative correlation between the time elapsed since last concussion and TBW width in the TOJ task suggests that precision in temporal perception does improve over time. These findings suggest that those with concussion history display an impairment in the perceived timing of sensory events and that monitoring performance in the SJ and TOJ tasks may be a useful additional assessment tool when making decisions about returning to regular work and play following concussion.
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Affiliation(s)
- Adrienne Wise
- Department of Kinesiology, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON, Canada
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46
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Henschke JU, Ohl FW, Budinger E. Crossmodal Connections of Primary Sensory Cortices Largely Vanish During Normal Aging. Front Aging Neurosci 2018; 10:52. [PMID: 29551970 PMCID: PMC5840148 DOI: 10.3389/fnagi.2018.00052] [Citation(s) in RCA: 7] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/23/2017] [Accepted: 02/15/2018] [Indexed: 11/22/2022] Open
Abstract
During aging, human response times (RTs) to unisensory and crossmodal stimuli decrease. However, the elderly benefit more from crossmodal stimulus representations than younger people. The underlying short-latency multisensory integration process is mediated by direct crossmodal connections at the level of primary sensory cortices. We investigate the age-related changes of these connections using a rodent model (Mongolian gerbil), retrograde tracer injections into the primary auditory (A1), somatosensory (S1), and visual cortex (V1), and immunohistochemistry for markers of apoptosis (Caspase-3), axonal plasticity (Growth associated protein 43, GAP 43), and a calcium-binding protein (Parvalbumin, PV). In adult animals, primary sensory cortices receive a substantial number of direct thalamic inputs from nuclei of their matched, but also from nuclei of non-matched sensory modalities. There are also direct intracortical connections among primary sensory cortices and connections with secondary sensory cortices of other modalities. In very old animals, the crossmodal connections strongly decrease in number or vanish entirely. This is likely due to a retraction of the projection neuron axonal branches rather than ongoing programmed cell death. The loss of crossmodal connections is also accompanied by changes in anatomical correlates of inhibition and excitation in the sensory thalamus and cortex. Together, the loss and restructuring of crossmodal connections during aging suggest a shift of multisensory processing from primary cortices towards other sensory brain areas in elderly individuals.
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Affiliation(s)
- Julia U Henschke
- Department Systems Physiology of Learning, Leibniz Institute for Neurobiology, Magdeburg, Germany.,Department Genetics, Leibniz Institute for Neurobiology, Magdeburg, Germany.,German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases within the Helmholtz Association, Magdeburg, Germany.,Institute of Cognitive Neurology and Dementia Research (IKND), Otto-von-Guericke-University Magdeburg, Magdeburg, Germany.,Center for Behavioral Brain Sciences, Magdeburg, Germany
| | - Frank W Ohl
- Department Systems Physiology of Learning, Leibniz Institute for Neurobiology, Magdeburg, Germany.,Center for Behavioral Brain Sciences, Magdeburg, Germany.,Institute of Biology, Otto-von-Guericke-University Magdeburg, Magdeburg, Germany
| | - Eike Budinger
- Department Systems Physiology of Learning, Leibniz Institute for Neurobiology, Magdeburg, Germany.,Center for Behavioral Brain Sciences, Magdeburg, Germany
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47
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Comparison for younger and older adults: Stimulus temporal asynchrony modulates audiovisual integration. Int J Psychophysiol 2018; 124:1-11. [DOI: 10.1016/j.ijpsycho.2017.12.004] [Citation(s) in RCA: 24] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/03/2017] [Revised: 12/05/2017] [Accepted: 12/11/2017] [Indexed: 11/22/2022]
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48
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Roudaia E, Calabro F, Vaina L, Newell F. Aging Impairs Audiovisual Facilitation of Object Motion Within Self-Motion. Multisens Res 2018; 31:251-272. [DOI: 10.1163/22134808-00002600] [Citation(s) in RCA: 6] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/10/2017] [Accepted: 07/27/2017] [Indexed: 11/19/2022]
Abstract
The presence of a moving sound has been shown to facilitate the detection of an independently moving visual target embedded among an array of identical moving objects simulating forward self-motion (Calabro et al., Proc. R. Soc. B, 2011). Given that the perception of object motion within self-motion declines with aging, we investigated whether older adults can also benefit from the presence of a congruent dynamic sound when detecting object motion within self-motion. Visual stimuli consisted of nine identical spheres randomly distributed inside a virtual rectangular prism. For 1 s, all the spheres expanded outward simulating forward observer translation at a constant speed. One of the spheres (the target) had independent motion either approaching or moving away from the observer at three different speeds. In the visual condition, stimuli contained no sound. In the audiovisual condition, the visual stimulus was accompanied by a broadband noise sound co-localized with the target, whose loudness increased or decreased congruent with the target’s direction. Participants reported which of the spheres had independent motion. Younger participants showed higher target detection accuracy in the audiovisual compared to the visual condition at the slowest speed level. Older participants showed overall poorer target detection accuracy than the younger participants, but the presence of the sound had no effect on older participants’ target detection accuracy at either speed level. These results indicate that aging may impair cross-modal integration in some contexts. Potential reasons for the absence of auditory facilitation in older adults are discussed.
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Affiliation(s)
- Eugenie Roudaia
- School of Psychology and Institute of Neuroscience, Trinity College Dublin, Dublin, Ireland
| | - Finnegan J. Calabro
- Brain and Vision Research Laboratory, Department of Biomedical Engineering, Boston University, Boston, MA, USA
- Department of Psychiatry and Department of Bioengineering, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA, USA
| | - Lucia M. Vaina
- Brain and Vision Research Laboratory, Department of Biomedical Engineering, Boston University, Boston, MA, USA
- Department of Neurology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
| | - Fiona N. Newell
- School of Psychology and Institute of Neuroscience, Trinity College Dublin, Dublin, Ireland
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49
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Chan JS, Connolly SK, Setti A. The Number of Stimulus-Onset Asynchronies Affects the Perception of the Sound-Induced Flash Illusion in Young and Older Adults. Multisens Res 2018; 31:175-190. [PMID: 31264623 DOI: 10.1163/22134808-00002605] [Citation(s) in RCA: 27] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/12/2017] [Accepted: 08/08/2017] [Indexed: 11/19/2022]
Abstract
The sound-induced flash illusion is a multisensory illusion occurring when one flash is presented with two beeps and perceived as two flashes. Younger individuals are largely susceptible to the illusion when the stimulus onset asynchrony between the first and the second beep falls within the temporal window of integration, but the susceptibility falls dramatically outside of this short temporal range. Older individuals, in particular older adults prone to falling and/or mild cognitive impairment, show an extended susceptibility to the illusion. This suggests that they have inefficient multisensory integration, particularly in the temporal domain. In the present study, we investigated the reliability of the illusion across younger and older people, guided by the hypothesis that the experimental context, i.e., exposure to a wider or smaller number of stimulus onset asynchronies, would modify the intra-personal susceptibility to the illusion at shorter asynchronies vs. longer asynchronies, likely due to the gathering of model evidence based on Bayesian inference. We tested 22 young adults and 29 older adults and verified these hypotheses. Both groups showed higher susceptibility to the illusion when exposed to a smaller range of asynchronies, but only for longer ones, not within the 100 ms window. We discuss the theoretical implications in terms of online perceptual learning and practical implications in terms of standardisation of the experimental context when attempting to find normative values.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jason S Chan
- School of Applied Psychology, University College Cork, Cork, Ireland
| | | | - Annalisa Setti
- School of Applied Psychology, University College Cork, Cork, Ireland
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50
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Lupo J, Barnett-Cowan M. Impaired perceived timing of falls in the elderly. Gait Posture 2018; 59:40-45. [PMID: 28987765 DOI: 10.1016/j.gaitpost.2017.09.037] [Citation(s) in RCA: 15] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/11/2017] [Revised: 09/26/2017] [Accepted: 09/27/2017] [Indexed: 02/02/2023]
Abstract
Falls are the leading cause of injury-related deaths and hospitalizations, with older adults at an increased risk. As humans age, physical changes and health conditions make falls more likely. While we know how the body reflexively responds to prevent injury during a fall, we know little about how people perceive the fall itself. We previously found that young adults required a fall to precede a comparison sound stimulus by approximately 44ms to perceive the two events as simultaneous. This may relate to common anecdotal reports suggesting that humans often describe distortions in their perception of time - time seems to slow down during a fall - with very little recollection of how and when the fall began. Here we examine whether fall perception changes with age. Young (19-25y) and older (61-72y) healthy adults made temporal order judgments identifying whether the onset of their fall or the onset of a comparison sound came first to measure the point of subjective simultaneity. Results show that fall perception is nearly twice as slow for older adults, where perturbation onset has to precede sound onset by ∼88ms to appear coincident, compared to younger adults (∼44ms). We suggest that such age-related differences in fall perception may relate to increased fall rates in older adults. We conclude that a better understanding of how younger versus older adults perceive falls may identify important factors for innovative fall prevention strategies and rehabilitative training exercises to improve fall awareness.
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Affiliation(s)
- Julian Lupo
- Department of Kinesiology, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Ontario, N2L 3G1, Canada.
| | - Michael Barnett-Cowan
- Department of Kinesiology, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Ontario, N2L 3G1, Canada.
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