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Full-Text Articles in Medicine and Health Sciences

Virtual Reality As A Training Tool To Treat Physical Inactivity In Children, Adam W. Kiefer, David Pincus, Michael J. Richardson, Gregory D. Myer Dec 2017

Virtual Reality As A Training Tool To Treat Physical Inactivity In Children, Adam W. Kiefer, David Pincus, Michael J. Richardson, Gregory D. Myer

Psychology Faculty Articles and Research

Lack of adequate physical activity in children is an epidemic that can result in obesity and other poor health outcomes across the lifespan. Physical activity interventions focused on motor skill competence continue to be developed, but some interventions, such as neuromuscular training (NMT), may be limited in how early they can be implemented due to dependence on the child’s level of cognitive and perceptual-motor development. Early implementation of motor-rich activities that support motor skill development in children is critical for the development of healthy levels of physical activity that carry through into adulthood. Virtual reality (VR) training may be beneficial …


The Climate Of Neurofeedback: Scientific Rigour And The Perils Of Ideology, Robert T. Thibault, Michael Lifshitz, Amir Raz Dec 2017

The Climate Of Neurofeedback: Scientific Rigour And The Perils Of Ideology, Robert T. Thibault, Michael Lifshitz, Amir Raz

Psychology Faculty Articles and Research

Over the last six decades, an in-group with ideological and financial stakes has been conducting sub-par research to develop an ostensibly effective clinical intervention: EEG-neurofeedback. More recently, however, a string of independent studies featuring increased scientific rigour and tighter experimental controls has challenged the foundation on which EEG-neurofeedback stands. Earlier this year, Brain published one of the most robust EEG-neurofeedback experiments to date (Schabus et al., 2017), which sparked a flurry of correspondence concerning the therapeutic value of neurofeedback (Fovet et al., 2017; Schabus, 2017); notably, a parallel discussion continues in Lancet Psychiatry …


Volition And Action In The Human Brain: Processes, Pathologies, And Reasons, Itzhak Fried, Patrick Haggard, Biyu J. He, Aaron Schurger Nov 2017

Volition And Action In The Human Brain: Processes, Pathologies, And Reasons, Itzhak Fried, Patrick Haggard, Biyu J. He, Aaron Schurger

Psychology Faculty Articles and Research

Humans seem to decide for themselves what to do, and when to do it. This distinctive capacity may emerge from an ability, shared with other animals, to make decisions for action that are related to future goals, or at least free from the constraints of immediate environmental inputs. Studying such volitional acts proves a major challenge for neuroscience. This review highlights key mechanisms in the generation of voluntary, as opposed to stimulus-driven actions, and highlights three issues. The first part focuses on the apparent spontaneity of voluntary action. The second part focuses on one of the most distinctive, but elusive, …


Theta-Burst Microstimulation In The Human Entorhinal Area Improves Memory Specificity, Ali S. Titiz, Michael R. H. Hill, Emily A. Mankin, Zahra M. Aghajan, Dawn Eliashiv, Natalia Tchemodanov, Uri Maoz, John Stern, Michelle E. Tran, Peter Schuette, Eric Behnke, Nanthia A. Suthana, Itzhak Fried Oct 2017

Theta-Burst Microstimulation In The Human Entorhinal Area Improves Memory Specificity, Ali S. Titiz, Michael R. H. Hill, Emily A. Mankin, Zahra M. Aghajan, Dawn Eliashiv, Natalia Tchemodanov, Uri Maoz, John Stern, Michelle E. Tran, Peter Schuette, Eric Behnke, Nanthia A. Suthana, Itzhak Fried

Psychology Faculty Articles and Research

The hippocampus is critical for episodic memory, and synaptic changes induced by long-term potentiation (LTP) are thought to underlie memory formation. In rodents, hippocampal LTP may be induced through electrical stimulation of the perforant path. To test whether similar techniques could improve episodic memory in humans, we implemented a microstimulation technique that allowed delivery of low-current electrical stimulation via 100 μm-diameter microelectrodes. As thirteen neurosurgical patients performed a person recognition task, microstimulation was applied in a theta-burst pattern, shown to optimally induce LTP. Microstimulation in the right entorhinal area during learning significantly improved subsequent memory specificity for novel portraits; participants …


The Psychology Of Neurofeedback: Clinical Intervention Even If Applied Placebo, Robert T. Thibault, Amir Raz Oct 2017

The Psychology Of Neurofeedback: Clinical Intervention Even If Applied Placebo, Robert T. Thibault, Amir Raz

Psychology Faculty Articles and Research

Advocates of neurofeedback make bold claims concerning brain regulation, treatment of disorders, and mental health. Decades of research and thousands of peer-reviewed publications support neurofeedback using electroencephalography (EEG-nf); yet, few experiments isolate the act of receiving feedback from a specific brain signal as a necessary precursor to obtain the purported benefits. Moreover, while psychosocial parameters including participant motivation and expectation, rather than neurobiological substrates, seem to fuel clinical improvement across a wide range of disorders, for-profit clinics continue to sprout across North America and Europe. Here, we highlight the tenuous evidence supporting EEG-nf and sketch out the weaknesses of this …


Precursor Processes Of Human Self-Initiated Action, Nima Khalighinejad, Aaron Schurger, Andrea Desantis, Leor Zmigrod Sep 2017

Precursor Processes Of Human Self-Initiated Action, Nima Khalighinejad, Aaron Schurger, Andrea Desantis, Leor Zmigrod

Psychology Faculty Articles and Research

A gradual buildup of electrical potential over motor areas precedes self-initiated movements. Recently, such “readiness potentials” (RPs) were attributed to stochastic fluctuations in neural activity. We developed a new experimental paradigm that operationalized self-initiated actions as endogenous ‘skip’ responses while waiting for target stimuli in a perceptual decision task. We compared these to a block of trials where participants could not choose when to skip, but were instead instructed to skip. Frequency and timing of motor action were therefore balanced across blocks, so that conditions differed only in how the timing of skip decisions was generated. We reasoned that across-trial …


Neurofeedback Or Neuroplacebo?, Robert T. Thibault, Michael Lifshitz, Amir Raz Mar 2017

Neurofeedback Or Neuroplacebo?, Robert T. Thibault, Michael Lifshitz, Amir Raz

Psychology Faculty Articles and Research

This scientific commentary refers to ‘Better than sham? A double-blind placebo-controlled neurofeedback study in primary insomnia’, by Schabus et al.. (doi:10.1093/brain/awx011).