TY - JOUR A1 - Lugo, Zulay R. A1 - Quitadamo, Lucia R. A1 - Bianchi, Luigi A1 - Pellas, Fréderic A1 - Veser, Sandra A1 - Lesenfants, Damien A1 - Real, Ruben G. L. A1 - Herbert, Cornelia A1 - Guger, Christoph A1 - Kotchoubey, Boris A1 - Mattia, Donatella A1 - Kübler, Andrea A1 - Laureys, Steven A1 - Noirhomme, Quentin T1 - Cognitive Processing in Non-Communicative Patients: What Can Event-Related Potentials Tell Us? JF - Frontiers in Human Neuroscience N2 - Event-related potentials (ERP) have been proposed to improve the differential diagnosis of non-responsive patients. We investigated the potential of the P300 as a reliable marker of conscious processing in patients with locked-in syndrome (LIS). Eleven chronic LIS patients and 10 healthy subjects (HS) listened to a complex-tone auditory oddball paradigm, first in a passive condition (listen to the sounds) and then in an active condition (counting the deviant tones). Seven out of nine HS displayed a P300 waveform in the passive condition and all in the active condition. HS showed statistically significant changes in peak and area amplitude between conditions. Three out of seven LIS patients showed the P3 waveform in the passive condition and five of seven in the active condition. No changes in peak amplitude and only a significant difference at one electrode in area amplitude were observed in this group between conditions. We conclude that, in spite of keeping full consciousness and intact or nearly intact cortical functions, compared to HS, LIS patients present less reliable results when testing with ERP, specifically in the passive condition. We thus strongly recommend applying ERP paradigms in an active condition when evaluating consciousness in non-responsive patients. KW - P300 KW - event-related potentials KW - locked-in syndrome KW - vegetative state KW - unresponsive wakefulness syndrome KW - minimally conscious state Y1 - 2016 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-165165 VL - 10 IS - 569 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Zhou, Sijie A1 - Allison, Brendan Z. A1 - Kübler, Andrea A1 - Cichocki, Andrzej A1 - Wang, Xingyu A1 - Jin, Jing T1 - Effects of Background Music on Objective and Subjective Performance Measures in an Auditory BCI JF - Frontiers in Computational Neuroscience N2 - Several studies have explored brain computer interface (BCI) systems based on auditory stimuli, which could help patients with visual impairments. Usability and user satisfaction are important considerations in any BCI. Although background music can influence emotion and performance in other task environments, and many users may wish to listen to music while using a BCI, auditory, and other BCIs are typically studied without background music. Some work has explored the possibility of using polyphonic music in auditory BCI systems. However, this approach requires users with good musical skills, and has not been explored in online experiments. Our hypothesis was that an auditory BCI with background music would be preferred by subjects over a similar BCI without background music, without any difference in BCI performance. We introduce a simple paradigm (which does not require musical skill) using percussion instrument sound stimuli and background music, and evaluated it in both offline and online experiments. The result showed that subjects preferred the auditory BCI with background music. Different performance measures did not reveal any significant performance effect when comparing background music vs. no background. Since the addition of background music does not impair BCI performance but is preferred by users, auditory (and perhaps other) BCIs should consider including it. Our study also indicates that auditory BCIs can be effective even if the auditory channel is simultaneously otherwise engaged. KW - brain computer interface KW - event-related potentials KW - auditory KW - music background KW - audio stimulus Y1 - 2016 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-165101 VL - 10 IS - 105 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Halder, Sebastian A1 - Hammer, Eva Maria A1 - Kleih, Sonja Claudia A1 - Bogdan, Martin A1 - Rosenstiel, Wolfgang A1 - Birbaumer, Niels A1 - Kübler, Andrea T1 - Prediction of Auditory and Visual P300 Brain-Computer Interface Aptitude JF - PLoS ONE N2 - Objective Brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) provide a non-muscular communication channel for patients with late-stage motoneuron disease (e.g., amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS)) or otherwise motor impaired people and are also used for motor rehabilitation in chronic stroke. Differences in the ability to use a BCI vary from person to person and from session to session. A reliable predictor of aptitude would allow for the selection of suitable BCI paradigms. For this reason, we investigated whether P300 BCI aptitude could be predicted from a short experiment with a standard auditory oddball. Methods Forty healthy participants performed an electroencephalography (EEG) based visual and auditory P300-BCI spelling task in a single session. In addition, prior to each session an auditory oddball was presented. Features extracted from the auditory oddball were analyzed with respect to predictive power for BCI aptitude. Results Correlation between auditory oddball response and P300 BCI accuracy revealed a strong relationship between accuracy and N2 amplitude and the amplitude of a late ERP component between 400 and 600 ms. Interestingly, the P3 amplitude of the auditory oddball response was not correlated with accuracy. Conclusions Event-related potentials recorded during a standard auditory oddball session moderately predict aptitude in an audiory and highly in a visual P300 BCI. The predictor will allow for faster paradigm selection. Significance Our method will reduce strain on patients because unsuccessful training may be avoided, provided the results can be generalized to the patient population. KW - experimental design KW - acoustic signals KW - amyotrophic lateral sclerosis KW - man-computer interface KW - electroencephalography KW - event-related potentials KW - physical properties KW - vision Y1 - 2013 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-130327 VL - 8 IS - 2 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Meule, Adrian A1 - Kübler, Andrea A1 - Blechert, Jens T1 - Time course of electrocortical food-cue responses during cognitive regulation of craving JF - Frontiers in Psychology N2 - In our current obesogenic environment, exposure to visual food-cues can easily lead to craving and overeating because short-term, pleasurable effects of food intake dominate over the anticipated long-term adverse effects such as weight gain and associated health problems. Here we contrasted these two conditions during food-cue presentation while acquiring event-related potentials (ERPs) and subjective craving ratings. Female participants (n = 25) were presented with either high-calorie (HC) or low-calorie (LC) food images under instructions to imagine either immediate (NOW) or long-term effects (LATER) of consumption. On subjective ratings for HC foods, the LATER perspective reduced cravings as compared to the NOW perspective. For LC foods, by contrast, craving increased under the LATER perspective. Early ERPs (occipital N1, 150-200 ms) were sensitive to food type but not to perspective. Late ERPs (late positive potential, LPP, 350-550 ms) were larger in the HC-LATER condition than in all other conditions, possibly indicating that a cognitive focus on negative long-term consequences induced negative arousal. This enhancement for HC-LATER attenuated to the level of the LC conditions during the later slow wave (550-3000 ms), but amplitude in the HC-NOW condition was larger than in all other conditions, possibly due to a delayed appetitive response. Across all conditions, LPP amplitudes were positively correlated with self-reported emotional eating. In sum, results reveal that regulation effects are secondary to an early attentional analysis of food type and dynamically evolve over time. Adopting a long-term perspective on eating might promote a healthier food choice across a range of food types. KW - EEG KW - disorder examination questionnaire KW - eating disorder KW - emotion regulation KW - future directions KW - attention KW - brain KW - high-calorie KW - german version KW - bulimia nervosa KW - chocolate images KW - event-related potentials KW - eating KW - calorie content KW - food-cues KW - food craving KW - LPP KW - slow wave Y1 - 2013 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-122566 SN - 1664-1078 VL - 4 IS - 669 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Erlbeck, Helena A1 - Kübler, Andrea A1 - Kotchoubey, Boris A1 - Veser, Sandra T1 - Task instructions modulate the attentional mode affecting the auditory MMN and the semantic N400 JF - Frontiers in Human Neuroscience N2 - Event-related potentials (ERPs) have been proven to be a useful tool to complement clinical assessment and to detect residual cognitive functions in patients with disorders of consciousness. These ERPs are of ten recorded using passive or unspecific instructions. Patient data obtained this way are then compared to data from healthy participants, which are usually recorded using active instructions. The present study investigates the effect of attentive modulations and particularly the effect of activevs. passive instruction on the ERP components mismatch negativity (MMN) and N400. A sample of 18 healthy participants listened to three auditory paradigms: anoddball, aword priming, and a sentence paradigm. Each paradigm was presented three times with different instructions: ignoring auditory stimuli, passive listening, and focused attention on the auditory stimuli. After each task, the participants indicated their subjective effort. The N400 decreased from the focused task to the passive task, and was extinct in the ignore task. The MMN exhibited higher amplitudes in the focused and passive task compared to the ignore task. The data indicate an effect of attention on the supratemporal component of the MMN. Subjective effort was equally high in the passive and focused tasks but reduced in the ignore task. We conclude that passive listening during EEG recording is stressful and attenuates ERPs, which renders the interpretation of the results obtained in such conditions difficult. KW - ERP KW - priming KW - selective attention KW - event-related potentials KW - vigilance decrement KW - brain potentials KW - vegetative state KW - consciousness KW - component KW - predicts recovery KW - mismatch negativity KW - attention KW - instruction KW - N400 KW - MMN Y1 - 2014 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-115553 VL - 8 IS - 654 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Halder, Sebastian A1 - Ruf, Carolin Anne A1 - Furdea, Adrian A1 - Pasqualotto, Emanuele A1 - De Massari, Daniele A1 - van der Heiden, Linda A1 - Bogdan, Martin A1 - Rosenstiel, Wolfgang A1 - Birbaumer, Niels A1 - Kübler, Andrea A1 - Matuz, Tamara T1 - Prediction of P300 BCI Aptitude in Severe Motor Impairment JF - PLoS ONE N2 - Brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) provide a non-muscular communication channel for persons with severe motor impairments. Previous studies have shown that the aptitude with which a BCI can be controlled varies from person to person. A reliable predictor of performance could facilitate selection of a suitable BCI paradigm. Eleven severely motor impaired participants performed three sessions of a P300 BCI web browsing task. Before each session auditory oddball data were collected to predict the BCI aptitude of the participants exhibited in the current session. We found a strong relationship of early positive and negative potentials around 200 ms (elicited with the auditory oddball task) with performance. The amplitude of the P2 (r = −0.77) and of the N2 (r = −0.86) had the strongest correlations. Aptitude prediction using an auditory oddball was successful. The finding that the N2 amplitude is a stronger predictor of performance than P3 amplitude was reproduced after initially showing this effect with a healthy sample of BCI users. This will reduce strain on the end-users by minimizing the time needed to find suitable paradigms and inspire new approaches to improve performance. KW - amyothropic lateral sclerosis KW - electrode potentials KW - electroencephalography KW - event-related potentials KW - functional magnetic imaging KW - human performance KW - man-computer interface KW - topography Y1 - 2013 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-97268 ER -