Differential contributions of the two human cerebral hemispheres to action timing

Abstract

Rhythmic actions benefit from synchronization with external events. Auditory-paced finger tapping studies indicate the two cerebral hemispheres preferentially control different rhythms. It is unclear whether left-lateralized processing of faster rhythms and right-lateralized processing of slower rhythms bases upon hemispheric timing differences that arise in the motor or sensory system or whether asymmetry results from lateralized sensorimotor interactions. We measured fMRI and MEG during symmetric finger tapping, in which fast tapping was defined as auditory-motor synchronization at 2.5 Hz. Slow tapping corresponded to tapping to every fourth auditory beat (0.625 Hz). We demonstrate that the left auditory cortex preferentially represents the relative fast rhythm in an amplitude modulation of low beta oscillations while the right auditory cortex additionally represents the internally generated slower rhythm. We show coupling of auditory-motor beta oscillations supports building a metric structure. Our findings reveal a strong contribution of sensory cortices to hemispheric specialization in action control.

Differential contributions of the two cerebral hemispheres to temporal and spectral speech feedback control

“…Spectral adaptation also increased connectivity between L aSTS and L IPS and between R pSTS and HG ( auditory association cortex connected more strongly with the left SMA following temporal perturbations. The SMA has been implicated in action timing and in processing temporal aspects of sensory input [34][35][36][37][38] . We thus propose the SMA as an additional motor-to-auditory interface that internally translates the temporal structure of articulator actions into expected auditory consequences.…”

“…Differential sensitivity of the two cerebral hemispheres to temporal and spectral modulation rates in acoustic signals has been proposed to result in auditory representations with high temporal and low spectral resolution in the left hemisphere compared to auditory representations with low temporal and high spectral resolution in the right. Accordingly, also the right auditory association cortex represents temporal information, although with relative low temporal resolution, during speech perception 44 or during nonspeech auditory-motor control 38 . In our experiments, the temporal perturbation increased phoneme duration by about 50 ms.…”

Handedness Development: A Model for Investigating the Development of Hemispheric Specialization and Interhemispheric Coordination

“…What is frequently missing from spatial and temporal frequency notions of hemisphere differences in processing hierarchically structured stimulus patterns is that the hemispheres also differ for the construction of actions. Data from animals [64] and humans [65] show that the left and right hemispheres of the brain confer asymmetric contributions to the organization and manifestation of sensorimotor processes and manual actions. Therefore, motor behaviors can be informative behavioral markers of asymmetric brain function and organization.…”

Handedness Development: A Model for Investigating the Development of Hemispheric Specialization and Interhemispheric Coordination

“…What is frequently missing from spatial and temporal frequency notions of hemisphere differences in processing hierarchically structured stimulus patterns is that the hemispheres also differ for the construction of actions. Data from animals (Forrester & Todd, 2018) and humans (Pflug, et al, 2019) show that the left and right hemispheres of the brain confer asymmetric contributions to the organization and manifestation of sensorimotor processes and manual actions. Therefore, motor behaviors can be informative behavioral markers of asymmetric brain function and organization.…”