TY - JOUR A1 - Madeira, Octavia A1 - Gromer, Daniel A1 - Latoschik, Marc Erich A1 - Pauli, Paul T1 - Effects of Acrophobic Fear and Trait Anxiety on Human Behavior in a Virtual Elevated Plus-Maze JF - Frontiers in Virtual Reality N2 - The Elevated Plus-Maze (EPM) is a well-established apparatus to measure anxiety in rodents, i.e., animals exhibiting an increased relative time spent in the closed vs. the open arms are considered anxious. To examine whether such anxiety-modulated behaviors are conserved in humans, we re-translated this paradigm to a human setting using virtual reality in a Cave Automatic Virtual Environment (CAVE) system. In two studies, we examined whether the EPM exploration behavior of humans is modulated by their trait anxiety and also assessed the individuals’ levels of acrophobia (fear of height), claustrophobia (fear of confined spaces), sensation seeking, and the reported anxiety when on the maze. First, we constructed an exact virtual copy of the animal EPM adjusted to human proportions. In analogy to animal EPM studies, participants (N = 30) freely explored the EPM for 5 min. In the second study (N = 61), we redesigned the EPM to make it more human-adapted and to differentiate influences of trait anxiety and acrophobia by introducing various floor textures and lower walls of closed arms to the height of standard handrails. In the first experiment, hierarchical regression analyses of exploration behavior revealed the expected association between open arm avoidance and Trait Anxiety, an even stronger association with acrophobic fear. In the second study, results revealed that acrophobia was associated with avoidance of open arms with mesh-floor texture, whereas for trait anxiety, claustrophobia, and sensation seeking, no effect was detected. Also, subjects’ fear rating was moderated by all psychometrics but trait anxiety. In sum, both studies consistently indicate that humans show no general open arm avoidance analogous to rodents and that human EPM behavior is modulated strongest by acrophobic fear, whereas trait anxiety plays a subordinate role. Thus, we conclude that the criteria for cross-species validity are met insufficiently in this case. Despite the exploratory nature, our studies provide in-depth insights into human exploration behavior on the virtual EPM. KW - elevated plus-maze KW - EPM KW - anxiety KW - virtual reality KW - translational neuroscience KW - acrophobia KW - trait anxiety Y1 - 2021 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-258709 VL - 2 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Winter, Carla A1 - Kern, Florian A1 - Gall, Dominik A1 - Latoschik, Marc Erich A1 - Pauli, Paul A1 - Käthner, Ivo T1 - Immersive virtual reality during gait rehabilitation increases walking speed and motivation: a usability evaluation with healthy participants and individuals with multiple sclerosis and stroke JF - Journal of Neuroengineering and Rehabilitation N2 - Background: The rehabilitation of gait disorders in patients with multiple sclerosis (MS) and stroke is often based on conventional treadmill training. Virtual reality (VR)-based treadmill training can increase motivation and improve therapy outcomes. The present study evaluated an immersive virtual reality application (using a head-mounted display, HMD) for gait rehabilitation with patients to (1) demonstrate its feasibility and acceptance and to (2) compare its short-term effects to a semi-immersive presentation (using a monitor) and a conventional treadmill training without VR to assess the usability of both systems and estimate the effects on walking speed and motivation. Methods: In a within-subjects study design, 36 healthy participants and 14 persons with MS or stroke participated in each of the three experimental conditions (VR via HMD, VR via monitor, treadmill training without VR). Results: For both groups, the walking speed in the HMD condition was higher than in treadmill training without VR and in the monitor condition. Healthy participants reported a higher motivation after the HMD condition as compared with the other conditions. Importantly, no side effects in the sense of simulator sickness occurred and usability ratings were high. No increases in heart rate were observed following the VR conditions. Presence ratings were higher for the HMD condition compared with the monitor condition for both user groups. Most of the healthy study participants (89%) and patients (71%) preferred the HMD-based training among the three conditions and most patients could imagine using it more frequently. Conclusions For the first time, the present study evaluated the usability of an immersive VR system for gait rehabilitation in a direct comparison with a semi-immersive system and a conventional training without VR with healthy participants and patients. The study demonstrated the feasibility of combining a treadmill training with immersive VR. Due to its high usability and low side effects, it might be particularly suited for patients to improve training motivation and training outcome e. g. the walking speed compared with treadmill training using no or only semi-immersive VR. Immersive VR systems still require specific technical setup procedures. This should be taken into account for specific clinical use-cases during a cost-benefit assessment. KW - rehabilitation KW - gait disorder KW - virtual reality KW - multiple sclerosis KW - stroke KW - head-mounted display KW - motivation Y1 - 2021 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-258698 SN - 1743-0003 VL - 18 IS - 1 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Liesner, Marvin A1 - Hinz, Nina-Alisa A1 - Kunde, Wilfried T1 - How Action Shapes Body Ownership Momentarily and Throughout the Lifespan JF - Frontiers in Human Neuroscience N2 - Objects which a human agent controls by efferent activities (such as real or virtual tools) can be perceived by the agent as belonging to his or her body. This suggests that what an agent counts as “body” is plastic, depending on what she or he controls. Yet there are possible limitations for such momentary plasticity. One of these limitations is that sensations stemming from the body (e.g., proprioception) and sensations stemming from objects outside the body (e.g., vision) are not integrated if they do not sufficiently “match”. What “matches” and what does not is conceivably determined by long–term experience with the perceptual changes that body movements typically produce. Children have accumulated less sensorimotor experience than adults have. Consequently, they express higher flexibility to integrate body-internal and body-external signals, independent of their “match” as suggested by rubber hand illusion studies. However, children’s motor performance in tool use is more affected by mismatching body-internal and body-external action effects than that of adults, possibly because of less developed means to overcome such mismatches. We review research on perception-action interactions, multisensory integration, and developmental psychology to build bridges between these research fields. By doing so, we account for the flexibility of the sense of body ownership for actively controlled events and its development through ontogeny. This gives us the opportunity to validate the suggested mechanisms for generating ownership by investigating their effects in still developing and incomplete stages in children. We suggest testable predictions for future studies investigating both body ownership and motor skills throughout the lifespan. KW - body ownership KW - attentional reweighting KW - children KW - haptic neglect KW - ideomotor theory KW - ontogeny KW - perception and action Y1 - 2021 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-241869 SN - 1662-5161 VL - 15 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Greving, Carla Elisabeth A1 - Richter, Tobias T1 - Beyond the Distributed Practice Effect: Is Distributed Learning Also Effective for Learning With Non-repeated Text Materials? JF - Frontiers in Psychology N2 - Distributed learning is often recommended as a general learning strategy, but previous research has established its benefits mainly for learning with repeated materials. In two experiments, we investigated distributed learning with complementary text materials. 77 (Experiment 1) and 130 (Experiment 2) seventh graders read two texts, massed vs. distributed, by 1 week (Experiment 1) or 15 min (Experiment 2). Learning outcomes were measured immediately and 1 week later and metacognitive judgments of learning were assessed. In Experiment 1, distributed learning was perceived as more difficult than massed learning. In both experiments, massed learning led to better outcomes immediately after learning but learning outcomes were lower after 1 week. No such decrease occurred for distributed learning, yielding similar outcomes for massed and distributed learning after 1 week. In sum, no benefits of distributed learning vs. massed learning were found, but distributed learning might lower the decrease in learning outcomes over time. KW - distributed practice KW - learning from text KW - retention interval KW - spacing effect KW - reading Y1 - 2021 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-247944 SN - 1664-1078 VL - 12 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Herzog, Katharina A1 - Andreatta, Marta A1 - Schneider, Kristina A1 - Schiele, Miriam A. A1 - Domschke, Katharina A1 - Romanos, Marcel A1 - Deckert, Jürgen A1 - Pauli, Paul T1 - Reducing Generalization of Conditioned Fear: Beneficial Impact of Fear Relevance and Feedback in Discrimination Training JF - Frontiers in Psychology N2 - Anxiety patients over-generalize fear, possibly because of an incapacity to discriminate threat and safety signals. Discrimination trainings are promising approaches for reducing such fear over-generalization. Here we investigated the efficacy of a fear-relevant vs. a fear-irrelevant discrimination training on fear generalization and whether the effects are increased with feedback during training. Eighty participants underwent two fear acquisition blocks, during which one face (conditioned stimulus, CS+), but not another face (CS−), was associated with a female scream (unconditioned stimulus, US). During two generalization blocks, both CSs plus four morphs (generalization stimuli, GS1–GS4) were presented. Between these generalization blocks, half of the participants underwent a fear-relevant discrimination training (discrimination between CS+ and the other faces) with or without feedback and the other half a fear-irrelevant discrimination training (discrimination between the width of lines) with or without feedback. US expectancy, arousal, valence ratings, and skin conductance responses (SCR) indicated successful fear acquisition. Importantly, fear-relevant vs. fear-irrelevant discrimination trainings and feedback vs. no feedback reduced generalization as reflected in US expectancy ratings independently from one another. No effects of training condition were found for arousal and valence ratings or SCR. In summary, this is a first indication that fear-relevant discrimination training and feedback can improve the discrimination between threat and safety signals in healthy individuals, at least for learning-related evaluations, but not evaluations of valence or (physiological) arousal. KW - fear generalization KW - feedback KW - discrimination training KW - fear-relevant training KW - classical conditioning Y1 - 2021 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-239970 SN - 1664-1078 VL - 12 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Rodrigues, Johannes A1 - Weiß, Martin A1 - Hewig, Johannes A1 - Allen, John J. B. T1 - EPOS: EEG Processing Open-Source Scripts JF - Frontiers in Neuroscience N2 - Background: Since the replication crisis, standardization has become even more important in psychological science and neuroscience. As a result, many methods are being reconsidered, and researchers’ degrees of freedom in these methods are being discussed as a potential source of inconsistencies across studies. New Method: With the aim of addressing these subjectivity issues, we have been working on a tutorial-like EEG (pre-)processing pipeline to achieve an automated method based on the semi-automated analysis proposed by Delorme and Makeig. Results: Two scripts are presented and explained step-by-step to perform basic, informed ERP and frequency-domain analyses, including data export to statistical programs and visual representations of the data. The open-source software EEGlab in MATLAB is used as the data handling platform, but scripts based on code provided by Mike Cohen (2014) are also included. Comparison with existing methods: This accompanying tutorial-like article explains and shows how the processing of our automated pipeline affects the data and addresses, especially beginners in EEG-analysis, as other (pre)-processing chains are mostly targeting rather informed users in specialized areas or only parts of a complete procedure. In this context, we compared our pipeline with a selection of existing approaches. Conclusion: The need for standardization and replication is evident, yet it is equally important to control the plausibility of the suggested solution by data exploration. Here, we provide the community with a tool to enhance the understanding and capability of EEG-analysis. We aim to contribute to comprehensive and reliable analyses for neuro-scientific research. KW - EEG KW - electroencephalography KW - event-related potentials-ERP KW - EEG processing KW - EEG preprocessing KW - EEG frequency band analysis Y1 - 2021 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-240221 SN - 1662-453X VL - 15 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Weiß, Martin A1 - Paelecke, Marko A1 - Hewig, Johannes T1 - In Your Face(t) — Personality Traits Interact With Prototypical Personality Faces in Economic Decision Making JF - Frontiers in Psychology N2 - In everyday life, assumptions about our peers' as well as our own personality shape social interactions. We investigated whether self-rated personality and inferences drawn from partners' faces influence economic decisions. Participants (N = 285) played the trust game in the role of the trustor as well as the ultimatum game in the role of the proposer and interacted with trustees and receivers represented by prototypical personality faces. Participants also evaluated both their own traits and the personality of the faces. In the trust game, trustees represented by faces rated higher on agreeableness yielded higher transferred amounts. This effect was more pronounced for trustors low on dispositional trust, whereas trustors high on dispositional trust did not relate their decisions to the faces. Trustees represented by faces rated higher on conscientiousness yielded higher transferred amounts only for trustors high on dispositional anxiety. In the ultimatum game, receivers represented by faces rated higher on conscientiousness yielded lower offers only for proposers high on dispositional assertiveness. These results extend previous findings on the inferences drawn from facial features and the influence of personality on decision making. They highlight the importance of considering the personality of both interaction partner, as well as potential interactions of players' traits. KW - big five KW - personality KW - trust game KW - personality faceaurus KW - ultimatum game Y1 - 2021 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-237051 SN - 1664-1078 VL - 12 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Brych, Mareike A1 - Murali, Supriya A1 - Händel, Barbara T1 - The Role of Blinks, Microsaccades and their Retinal Consequences in Bistable Motion Perception JF - Frontiers in Psychology N2 - Eye-related movements such as blinks and microsaccades are modulated during bistable perceptual tasks. However, if they play an active role during internal perceptual switches is not known. We conducted two experiments involving an ambiguous plaid stimulus, wherein participants were asked to continuously report their percept, which could consist of either unidirectional coherent or bidirectional component movement. Our main results show that blinks and microsaccades did not facilitate perceptual switches. On the contrary, a reduction in eye movements preceded the perceptual switch. Blanks, on the other hand, thought to mimic the retinal consequences of a blink, consistently led to a switch. Through the timing of the blank-introduced perceptual change, we were able to estimate the delay between the internal switch and the response. This delay further allowed us to evaluate that the reduction in blink probability co-occurred with the internal perceptual switch. Additionally, our results indicate that distinct internal processes underlie the switch to coherent vs. component percept. Blanks exclusively facilitated a switch to the coherent percept, and only the switch to coherent percept was followed by an increase in blink rate. In a second study, we largely replicated the findings and included a microsaccade analysis. Microsaccades only showed a weak relation with perceptual switches, but their direction was correlated with the perceived motion direction. Nevertheless, our data suggests an interaction between microsaccades and blinks by showing that microsaccades were differently modulated around blinks compared with blanks. This study shows that a reduction in eye movements precedes internal perceptual switches indicating that the rate of blinks can set the stage for a reinterpretation of sensory input. While a perceptual switch based on changed sensory input usually leads to an increase in blink rate, such an increase was only present after the perceptual switch to coherent motion but absent after the switch to component percept. This provides evidence of different underlying mechanism or internal consequence of the two perceptual switches and suggests that blinks can uncover differences in internal percept-related processes that are not evident from the percept itself. KW - eye movements KW - spontaneous eye blink KW - microsaccade rate KW - microsaccade direction KW - bistable perception KW - ambiguous plaid 4 Y1 - 2021 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-235217 SN - 1664-1078 VL - 12 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Farmer, Adam D. A1 - Strzelczyk, Adam A1 - Finisguerra, Alessandra A1 - Gourine, Alexander V. A1 - Gharabaghi, Alireza A1 - Hasan, Alkomiet A1 - Burger, Andreas M. A1 - Jaramillo, Andrés M. A1 - Mertens, Ann A1 - Majid, Arshad A1 - Verkuil, Bart A1 - Badran, Bashar W. A1 - Ventura-Bort, Carlos A1 - Gaul, Charly A1 - Beste, Christian A1 - Warren, Christopher M. A1 - Quintana, Daniel S. A1 - Hämmerer, Dorothea A1 - Freri, Elena A1 - Frangos, Eleni A1 - Tobaldini, Eleonora A1 - Kaniusas, Eugenijus A1 - Rosenow, Felix A1 - Capone, Fioravante A1 - Panetsos, Fivos A1 - Ackland, Gareth L. A1 - Kaithwas, Gaurav A1 - O'Leary, Georgia H. A1 - Genheimer, Hannah A1 - Jacobs, Heidi I. L. A1 - Van Diest, Ilse A1 - Schoenen, Jean A1 - Redgrave, Jessica A1 - Fang, Jiliang A1 - Deuchars, Jim A1 - Széles, Jozsef C. A1 - Thayer, Julian F. A1 - More, Kaushik A1 - Vonck, Kristl A1 - Steenbergen, Laura A1 - Vianna, Lauro C. A1 - McTeague, Lisa M. A1 - Ludwig, Mareike A1 - Veldhuizen, Maria G. A1 - De Couck, Marijke A1 - Casazza, Marina A1 - Keute, Marius A1 - Bikson, Marom A1 - Andreatta, Marta A1 - D'Agostini, Martina A1 - Weymar, Mathias A1 - Betts, Matthew A1 - Prigge, Matthias A1 - Kaess, Michael A1 - Roden, Michael A1 - Thai, Michelle A1 - Schuster, Nathaniel M. A1 - Montano, Nicola A1 - Hansen, Niels A1 - Kroemer, Nils B. A1 - Rong, Peijing A1 - Fischer, Rico A1 - Howland, Robert H. A1 - Sclocco, Roberta A1 - Sellaro, Roberta A1 - Garcia, Ronald G. A1 - Bauer, Sebastian A1 - Gancheva, Sofiya A1 - Stavrakis, Stavros A1 - Kampusch, Stefan A1 - Deuchars, Susan A. A1 - Wehner, Sven A1 - Laborde, Sylvain A1 - Usichenko, Taras A1 - Polak, Thomas A1 - Zaehle, Tino A1 - Borges, Uirassu A1 - Teckentrup, Vanessa A1 - Jandackova, Vera K. A1 - Napadow, Vitaly A1 - Koenig, Julian T1 - International Consensus Based Review and Recommendations for Minimum Reporting Standards in Research on Transcutaneous Vagus Nerve Stimulation (Version 2020) JF - Frontiers in Human Neuroscience N2 - Given its non-invasive nature, there is increasing interest in the use of transcutaneous vagus nerve stimulation (tVNS) across basic, translational and clinical research. Contemporaneously, tVNS can be achieved by stimulating either the auricular branch or the cervical bundle of the vagus nerve, referred to as transcutaneous auricular vagus nerve stimulation(VNS) and transcutaneous cervical VNS, respectively. In order to advance the field in a systematic manner, studies using these technologies need to adequately report sufficient methodological detail to enable comparison of results between studies, replication of studies, as well as enhancing study participant safety. We systematically reviewed the existing tVNS literature to evaluate current reporting practices. Based on this review, and consensus among participating authors, we propose a set of minimal reporting items to guide future tVNS studies. The suggested items address specific technical aspects of the device and stimulation parameters. We also cover general recommendations including inclusion and exclusion criteria for participants, outcome parameters and the detailed reporting of side effects. Furthermore, we review strategies used to identify the optimal stimulation parameters for a given research setting and summarize ongoing developments in animal research with potential implications for the application of tVNS in humans. Finally, we discuss the potential of tVNS in future research as well as the associated challenges across several disciplines in research and clinical practice. KW - transcutaneous vagus nerve stimulation KW - minimum reporting standards KW - guidelines & recommendations KW - transcutaneous auricular vagus nerve stimulation KW - transcutaneous cervical vagus nerve stimulation Y1 - 2021 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-234346 SN - 1662-5161 VL - 14 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Muñoz Centifanti, Luna C. A1 - Stickle, Timothy R. A1 - Thomas, Jamila A1 - Falcón, Amanda A1 - Thomson, Nicholas D. A1 - Gamer, Matthias T1 - Reflexive Gaze Shifts and Fear Recognition Deficits in Children with Callous-Unemotional Traits and Impulsivity/Conduct Problems JF - Brain Sciences N2 - The ability to efficiently recognize the emotions on others’ faces is something that most of us take for granted. Children with callous-unemotional (CU) traits and impulsivity/conduct problems (ICP), such as attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, have been previously described as being “fear blind”. This is also associated with looking less at the eye regions of fearful faces, which are highly diagnostic. Previous attempts to intervene into emotion recognition strategies have not had lasting effects on participants’ fear recognition abilities. Here we present both (a) additional evidence that there is a two-part causal chain, from personality traits to face recognition strategies using the eyes, then from strategies to rates of recognizing fear in others; and (b) a pilot intervention that had persistent effects for weeks after the end of instruction. Further, the intervention led to more change in those with the highest CU traits. This both clarifies the specific mechanisms linking personality to emotion recognition and shows that the process is fundamentally malleable. It is possible that such training could promote empathy and reduce the rates of antisocial behavior in specific populations in the future. KW - callous-unemotional traits KW - eye-tracking KW - emotions KW - conduct problems KW - emotion recognition Y1 - 2021 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-248536 SN - 2076-3425 VL - 11 IS - 10 ER -