Neuroscience and Neurobiology Commons^™

Developmental Influences On The Initial Subjective Rewarding Effects Of Etoh, Madison Waldron

Master’s Theses

The present studies were aimed to better understand developmental contributions to the risk for disordered drinking, and facilitate the long-term goal of developing effective interventions for individuals at high risk for alcohol use disorders. Experiment 1 assessed the effect of adolescent pre-exposure to ethanol on adult place preference, as well as, sex- and beta-endorphin(bE)-related contributions. Adolescent C57BL/6J and bE deficient mice were injected with 1.5g/kg of ethanol or saline and put back into their home cages. At the time of adulthood, we employed a single-exposure conditioned place preference paradigm (SE-CPP) to investigate the impact of preexposure on the initial subjective …

Mapping Specific Mental Content During Musical Imagery, Mor Regev, Andrea Halpern, Adrian Owen, Aniruddh Patel, Robert J. Zatorre

Faculty Journal Articles

Humans can mentally represent auditory information without an external stimulus, but the specificity of these internal representations remains unclear. Here, we asked how similar the temporally unfolding neural representations of imagined music are compared to those during the original perceived experience. We also tested whether rhythmic motion can influence the neural representation of music during imagery as during perception. Participants first memorized six 1-min-long instrumental musical pieces with high accuracy. Functional MRI data were collected during: 1) silent imagery of melodies to the beat of a visual metronome; 2) same but while tapping to the beat; and 3) passive listening. …

No Evidence That Portion Size Influences Food Consumption In Male Sprague Dawley Rats, Fabien Naniex, Sophie C. Pinder, Megan Y. Summers, Renee M. Rouleau, Eric Robinson, Kevin P. Myers, James E. Mccutcheon

Faculty Journal Articles

In studies of eating behavior that have been conducted in humans, the tendency to consume more when given larger portions of food, known as the portion size effect (PSE), is one of the most robust and widely replicated findings. Despite this, the mechanisms that underpin it are still unknown. In particular, it is unclear whether the PSE arises from higher-order social and cognitive processes that are unique to humans or, instead, reflects more fundamental processes that drive feeding, such as conditioned food-seeking. Importantly, studies in rodents and other animals have yet to show convincing evidence of a PSE. In this …

The Convergence Of Psychology And Neurobiology In Flavor-Nutrient Learning, Kevin P. Myers

Faculty Journal Articles

Flavor evaluation is influenced by learning from experience with foods. One main influence is flavor-nutrient learning (FNL), a Pavlovian process whereby a flavor acts as a conditioned stimulus (CS) that becomes associated with the postingestive effects of ingested nutrients (the US). As a result that flavor becomes preferred and intake typically increases. This learning powerfully influences food choice and meal patterning. This paper summarizes how research elucidating the physiological and neural substrates of FNL has progressed in parallel with work characterizing how FNL affects perception, motivation, and behavior. The picture that emerges from this work is of a robust system …

Investigating The Relationship Between Sulcogyral Patterns And Structural And Functional Connectivity Metrics In The Orbitofrontal Cortex, Bethany M. Blass

Honors Theses

Located within the frontal lobe, the human orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) is widely known for its roles in sensory integration, emotion processing, decision-making, and goal-directed behaviors. Atypical structural organization of the OFC may explain atypical social or motivational behaviors displayed by individuals with brain disorders, such as bipolar disorder patients (BP).

The human brain can be imaged using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to reveal interesting aspects of the underlying brain architecture. This brain is composed of different tissue types, including gray and white matter, as well as various morphological features, including sulci & gyri. Within the OFC, the sulci can be …

Sensory-Specific Satiety Is Intact In Rats Made Obese On A High-Fat, High-Sugar Choice Diet., Kevin P. Myers

Faculty Journal Articles

Sensory-specific satiety (SSS) is the temporary decreased pleasantness of a recently eaten food, which inhibits further eating. Evidence is currently mixed whether SSS is weaker in obese people, and whether such difference precedes or follows from the obese state. Animal models allow testing whether diet-induced obesity causes SSS impairment. Female rats (n = 24) were randomly assigned to an obesogenic high-fat, high-sugar choice diet or chow-only control. Tests of SSS involved pre-feeding a single palatable, distinctively-flavored food (cheese- or cocoa-flavored) prior to free choice between both foods. Rats were tested for short-term SSS (2 h pre-feeding immediately followed by 2 …

Feel The Noise: Relating Individual Differences In Auditory Imagery To The Structure And Function Of Sensorimotor Systems, Cesar F. Lima, Nadine Lavan, Samuel Evans, Zarinah Agnew, Andrea R. Halpern, Pradheep Shanmugalingam, Sophie Meekings, Dana Boebinger, Markus Ostarek, Carolyn Mcgettigan, Jane E. Warren, Sophie K. Scott

Faculty Journal Articles

Humans can generate mental auditory images of voices or songs, sometimes perceiving them almost as vividly as perceptual experiences. The functional networks supporting auditory imagery have been described, but less is known about the systems associated with interindividual differences in auditory imagery. Combining voxel-based morphometry and fMRI, we examined the structural basis of interindividual differences in how auditory images are subjectively perceived, and explored associations between auditory imagery, sensory-based processing, and visual imagery. Vividness of auditory imagery correlated with gray matter volume in the supplementary motor area (SMA), parietal cortex, medial superior frontal gyrus, and middle frontal gyrus. An analysis …

Sensory-Specific Appetition: Postingestive Detection Of Glucose Rapidly Promotes Continued Consumption Of A Recently Encountered Flavor, Kevin P. Myers, Marisa S. Taddeo, Emily K. Richards

Faculty Journal Articles

It is generally thought that macronutrients stimulate intake when sensed in the mouth (e.g., sweet taste) but as food enters the GI tract its effects become inhibitory, triggering satiation processes leading to meal termination. Here we report experiments extending recent work (see [1]) showing that under some circumstances nutrients sensed in the gut produce a positive feedback effect, immediately promoting continued intake. In one experiment, rats with intragastric (IG) catheters were accustomed to consuming novel flavors in saccharin daily while receiving water infused IG (5 ml/15 min). The very first time glucose (16% w/w) was infused IG instead of water, …

Rats Acquire Stronger Preference For Flavors Consumed Towards The End Of A High-Fat Meal, Kevin P. Myers

Faculty Journal Articles

Rats learn to prefer flavors associated with postingestive effects of nutrients. The physiological signals underlying this postingestive reward are unknown. We have previously shown that rats readily learn to prefer a flavor that was consumed early in a multi-flavored meal when glucose is infused intragastrically (IG), suggesting rapid postingestive reward onset. The present experiments investigate the timing of postingestive fat reward, by providing distinctive flavors in the first and second halves of meals accompanied by IG fat infusion. Learning stronger preference for the earlier or later flavor would indicate when the rewarding postingestive effects are sensed. Rats consumed sweetened, calorically-dilute …

Common Parietal Activation In Musical Mental Transformations Across Pitch And Time, Nicholas E.V. Foster, Andrea Halpern, Robert J. Zatorre

Faculty Journal Articles

We previously observed that mental manipulation of the pitch level or temporal organization of melodies results in functional activation in the human intraparietal sulcus (IPS), a region also associated with visuospatial transformation and numerical calculation. Two outstanding questions about these musical transformations are whether pitch and time depend on separate or common processing in IPS, and whether IPS recruitment in melodic tasks varies depending upon the degree of transformation required (as it does in mental rotation). In the present study we sought to answer these questions by applying functional magnetic resonance imaging while musicians performed closely matched mental transposition (pitch …

Rats Acquire Stronger Preference For Flavors Consumed Towards The End Of A High-Fat Meal, Kevin P. Myers

Faculty Journal Articles

Rats learn to prefer flavors associated with postingestive effects of nutrients. The physiological signals underlying this postingestive reward are unknown. We have previously shown that rats readily learn to prefer a flavor that was consumed early in a multi-flavored meal when glucose is infused intragastrically (IG), suggesting rapid postingestive reward onset. The present experiments investigate the timing of postingestive fat reward, by providing distinctive flavors in the first and second halves of meals accompanied by IG fat infusion. Learning stronger preference for the earlier or later flavor would indicate when the rewarding postingestive effects are sensed. Rats consumed sweetened, calorically-dilute …

The Effects Of Prenatal Exposure To Altered Melatonin Levels On Hippocampal Gene Expression In The Male Rat, Anna Uehara

Honors Theses

The stability of the circadian rhythm for mammals depends on the levels of serotonin and melatonin, neurohormones that signal for lightness and darkness, respectively. Disruption in the stability of neurohormones has been shown to be a critical factor in psychopathological disorders in humans. For example, altering levels of melatonin in utero through administration of melatonin or the melatonin receptor antagonist, luzindole, has been shown to cause changes in developmental growth and adult behavior in the male rat. Analysis of relative adult hippocampal gene expression with RT-PCR revealed differences in ARNTL expression that suggested abnormality in clock gene expression of the …

Investigation Into The Specificity Of Angiotensin Ii-Induced Behavioral Desensitization, Peter J. Vento, Kevin P. Myers, Derek Daniels

Faculty Journal Articles

Angiotensin II (AngII) plays a key role in maintaining body fluid homeostasis. The physiological and behavioral effects of central AngII include increased blood pressure and fluid intake. In vitro experiments demonstrate that repeated exposure to AngII reduces the efficacy of subsequent AngII, and behavioral studies indicate that prior icv AngII administration reduces the dipsogenic response to AngII administered later. Specifically, rats given a treatment regimen of three icv injections of a large dose of AngII, each separated by 20 min, drink less water in response to a test injection of AngII than do vehicle-treated controls given the same test injection. …

Dementia And Music: Challenges And Future Directions, Andrea Halpern

Faculty Journal Articles

No abstract provided.

Contextual Information And Memory For Unfamiliar Tunes In Older And Younger Adults, S.A. Deffler, Andrea Halpern

Faculty Journal Articles

We examined age differences in the effectiveness of multiple repetitions and providing associative facts on tune memory. For both tune and fact recognition, three presentations were beneficial. Age was irrelevant in fact recognition, but older adults were less successful than younger in tune recognition. The associative fact did not affect young adults' performance. Among older people, the neutral association harmed performance; the emotional fact mitigated performance back to baseline. Young adults seemed to rely solely on procedural memory, or repetition, to learn tunes. Older adults benefitted by using emotional associative information to counteract memory burdens imposed by neutral associative information.

The Persistence Of Musical Memories: A Descriptive Study Of Earworms, Andrea Halpern, J.C. Bartlett

Faculty Journal Articles

We describe some characteristics of persistent musical and verbal retrieval episodes, commonly known as "earworms." In Study 1, participants first filled out a survey summarizing their earworm experiences retrospectively. This was followed by a diary study to document each experience as it happened. Study 2 was an extension of the diary study with a larger sample and a focus on triggering events. Consistent with popular belief, these persistent musical memories were common across people and occurred frequently for most respondents, and were often linked to recent exposure to preferred music. Contrary to popular belief, the large majority of such experiences …

Perception Of Emotion In Sounded And Imagined Music, B.L. Lucas, E. Schubert, Andrea Halpern

Faculty Journal Articles

WE STUDIED THE EMOTIONAL RESPONSES BY MUSICIANS to familiar classical music excerpts both when the music was sounded, and when it was imagined.We used continuous response methodology to record response profiles for the dimensions of valence and arousal simultaneously and then on the single dimension of emotionality. The response profiles were compared using cross-correlation analysis, and an analysis of responses to musical feature turning points, which isolate instances of change in musical features thought to influence valence and arousal responses. We found strong similarity between the use of an emotionality arousal scale across the stimuli, regardless of condition (imagined …

Mental Reversal Of Imagined Melodies: A Role For The Posterior Parietal Cortex, R.J. Zatorre, Andrea Halpern, M. Bouffard

Faculty Journal Articles

Two fMRI experiments explored the neural substrates of a musical imagery task that required manipulation of the imagined sounds: temporal reversal of a melody. Musicians were presented with the first few notes of a familiar tune (Experiment 1) or its title (Experiment 2), followed by a string of notes that was either an exact or an inexact reversal. The task was to judge whether the second string was correct or not by mentally reversing all its notes, thus requiring both maintenance and manipulation of the represented string. Both experiments showed considerable activation of the superior parietal lobe (intraparietal sulcus) during …

Memory For Melodies, Andrea Halpern, J.C. Bartlett

Faculty Contributions to Books

No abstract provided.

Brain Activation During Anticipation Of Sound Sequences, A.M. Leaver, J. Van Lare, B. Zielinski, Andrea Halpern, J.P. Rauschecker

Faculty Journal Articles

Music consists of sound sequences that require integration over time. As we become familiar with music, associations between notes, melodies, and entire symphonic movements become stronger and more complex. These associations can become so tight that, for example, hearing the end of one album track can elicit a robust image of the upcoming track while anticipating it in total silence. Here, we study this predictive “anticipatory imagery” at various stages throughout learning and investigate activity changes in corresponding neural structures using functional magnetic resonance imaging. Anticipatory imagery (in silence) for highly familiar naturalistic music was accompanied by pronounced activity in …

Melody Recognition At Fast And Slow Tempos: Effects Of Age, Experience, And Familiarity, W.J. Dowling, J.C. Bartlett, Andrea Halpern, M.W. Andrews

Faculty Journal Articles

Eighty-one listeners defined by three age ranges (18–30, 31–59, and over 60 years) and three levels of musical experience performed an immediate recognition task requiring the detection of alterations in melodies. On each trial, a brief melody was presented, followed 5 sec later by a test stimulus that either was identical to the target or had two pitches changed, for a same–different judgment. Each melody pair was presented at 0.6 note/sec, 3.0 notes/sec, or 6.0 notes/sec. Performance was better with familiar melodies than with unfamiliar melodies. Overall performance declined slightly with age and improved substantially with increasing experience, in agreement …

Effects Of Timbre And Tempo Change On Memory For Music, Andrea Halpern, D. Mullensiefen

Faculty Journal Articles

We investigated the effects of different encoding tasks and of manipulations of two supposedly surface parameters of music on implicit and explicit memory for tunes. In two experiments, participants were first asked to either categorize instrument or judge familiarity of 40 unfamiliar short tunes. Subsequently, participants were asked to give explicit and implicit memory ratings for a list of 80 tunes, which included 40 previously heard. Half of the 40 previously heard tunes differed in timbre (Experiment 1) or tempo (Experiment 2) in comparison with the first exposure. A third experiment compared similarity ratings of the tunes that varied in …

I Know What I Like: Stability Of Aesthetic Preference In Alzheimer's Disease, Andrea Halpern, J. Ly, S. Elkin-Franklin, M.G. O'Connor

Faculty Journal Articles

Two studies explored the stability of art preference in patients with Alzheimer’s disease and age-matched control participants. Preferences for three different styles of paintings, displayed on art postcards, were examined over two sessions. Preference for specific paintings differed among individuals but AD and non-AD groups maintained about the same stability in terms of preference judgments across two weeks, even though the AD patients did not have explicit memory for the paintings. We conclude that aesthetic responses can be preserved in the face of cognitive decline. This should encourage caregivers and family to engage in arts appreciation activities with patients, and …

'Listen, Rama’S Wife!’: Maithil Women’S Perspectives And, A.M. Leaver, Andrea Halpern

Faculty Journal Articles

The two modes most widely used in Western music today convey opposite moods—a distinction that nonmusicians and even young children are able to make. However, the current studies provide evidence that, despite a strong link between mode and affect, mode perception is problematic. Nonmusicians found mode discrimination to be harder than discrimination of other melodic features, and they were not able to accurately classify major and minor melodies with these labels. Although nonmusicians were able to classify major and minor melodies using affective labels, they performed at chance in mode discrimination. Training, in the form of short lessons given to …

Behavioral And Neural Correlates Of Perceived And Imagined Musical Timbre, Andrea Halpern, R.J. Zattore, M. Bouffard, J.A. Johnson

Faculty Journal Articles

The generality of findings implicating secondary auditory areas in auditory imagery was tested by using a timbre imagery task with fMRI. Another aim was to test whether activity in supplementary motor area (SMA) seen in prior studies might have been related to subvocalization. Participants with moderate musical background were scanned while making similarity judgments about the timbre of heard or imagined musical instrument sounds. The critical control condition was a visual imagery task. The pattern of judgments in perceived and imagined conditions was similar, suggesting that perception and imagery access similar cognitive representations of timbre. As expected, judgments of heard …

Aging And Memory For Music: A Review, Andrea R. Halpern, J.C. Bartlett

Faculty Journal Articles

People of all ages enjoy listening to music, yet most research in musical development has concentrated on infancy through childhood. Our recent research program examined various aspects of music cognition in younger (ages 18 through 30) and older adults (ages 60 through 80) with varying amounts of musical experience. The studies investigated the independent and combined influences of age and experience on a wide assortment of long and short-term memory tasks. Results showed that some musical tasks reflect the same age-related declines as seen in nonmusical tasks, and musical training does not reduce these age-related declines. In other tasks, experience …

Cerebral Substrates Of Musical Imagery, Andrea Halpern

Faculty Contributions to Books

No abstract provided.

Absolute Pitch And Planum Temporale, J.P. Keenan, V. Thangaraj, Andrea Halpern, G.S. Schlaug

Faculty Journal Articles

An increased leftward asymmetry of the planum temporale (PT) in absolute-pitch (AP) musicians has been previously reported, with speculation that early exposure to music influences the degree of PT asymmetry. To test this hypothesis and to determine whether a larger left PT or a smaller right PT actually accounts for the increased overall PT asymmetry in AP musicians, anatomical magnetic resonance images were taken from a right-handed group of 27 AP musicians, 27 nonmusicians, and 22 non-AP musicians. A significantly greater leftward PT asymmetry and a significantly smaller right absolute PT size for the AP musicians compared to the two …

Hearing With The Mind's Eye, G. Schlaug, C. Chen, D. Press, Andrea Halpern, A. Warde, Q. Chen, A. Pascual-Leone

Faculty Journal Articles

No abstract provided.

Prediction Accuracy Of Young And Middle-Aged Adults In Memory For Familiar And Unfamiliar Texts, S.K. Johnson, Andrea Halpern

Faculty Journal Articles

This study investigated the influence of age, familiarity, and level of exposure on the metamemorial skill of prediction accuracy on a future test. Young (17 to 23 years old) and middle-aged adults (35 to 50 years old) were asked to predict their memory for text material. Participants made predictions on a familiar text and an unfamiliar text, at three different levels of exposure to each. The middle-aged adults were superior to the younger adults at predicting performance. This finding indicates that metamemory may increase from youth to middle age. Other findings include superior prediction accuracy for unfamiliar compared to familiar …