Cortical activation patterns to spatially presented pure tone stimuli with different intensities measured by functional near‐infrared spectroscopy

Abstract

Functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) is an emerging technique for the assessment of functional activity of the cerebral cortex. Recently fNIRS was also envisaged as a novel neuroimaging approach for measuring the auditory cortex activity in the field of in auditory diagnostics. This study aimed to investigate differences in brain activity related to spatially presented sounds with different intensities in 10 subjects by means of functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS). We found pronounced cortical activation patterns in the temporal and frontal regions of both hemispheres. In contrast to these activation patterns, we found deactivation patterns in central and parietal regions of both hemispheres. Furthermore our results showed an influence of spatial presentation and intensity of the presented sounds on brain activity in related regions of interest. These findings are in line with previous fMRI studies which also reported systematic changes of activation in temporal and frontal areas with increasing sound intensity. Although clear evidence for contralaterality effects and hemispheric asymmetries were absent in the group data, these effects were partially visible on the single subject level. Concluding, fNIRS is sensitive enough to capture differences in brain responses during the spatial presentation of sounds with different intensities in several cortical regions. Our results may serve as a valuable contribution for further basic research and the future use of fNIRS in the area of central auditory diagnostics.

Multivariate analysis of the systemic response to auditory stimulation: An integrative approach

“…Bauernfeind et al. (2018) also showed this relationship in auditory and frontal cortices. Ehlis et al.…”

Hemodynamic responses to emotional speech in two-month-old infants imaged using diffuse optical tomography

“…Bauernfeind et al . observed negative HbO 2 responses in the central and parietal regions of both hemispheres and positive HbO 2 responses in the middle temporal and frontal cortices in adults when exposed to pure tone auditory stimuli 66 . Additionally, we observed angry < baseline in aSTS, pSTS, STG, anterior insula and mid-insula, as well as happy < baseline in the anterior insula.…”

“…in 4- to 7-month-old infants 1 and Bauernfeind et al . in adults 66 in response to bilateral sounds. However, we observed no corresponding positive responses to neutral speech within the FOV of our probe that could explain it as a blood stealing effect.…”

Exploring the neural correlates of self-related names in healthy subjects

“…[ 16 ] What's more, 500 Hz, 1000 Hz, and 2000 Hz tones activated temporal and frontal regions, with higher intensity tones activating more frontal areas. [ 17 ] Therefore, it is reasonable that our moderate intensity 1000 Hz tone activated the temporal region.…”