EEG brain oscillations are modulated by interoception in response to a synchronized motor vs. cognitive task

Abstract

So far, little is known about how conscious attention to internal body signals, that is, interoception, affects the synchronization with another person, a necessary or required social process that promotes affiliations and cooperation during daily joint social interactions. The effect of explicit interoceptive attentiveness (IA) modulation, conceived as the focus on the breath for a given time interval, on electrophysiological (EEG) correlates during an interpersonal motor task compared with a cognitive synchronization task was investigated in this study. A total of 28 healthy participants performed a motor and a cognitive synchronization task during the focus and no-focus breath conditions. During the tasks, frequency bands (delta, theta, alpha, and beta bands) from the frontal, temporo-central, and parieto-occipital regions of interest (ROIs) were acquired. According to the results, significantly higher delta and theta power were found in the focus condition in the frontal ROI during the execution of the motor than the cognitive synchronization task. Moreover, in the same experimental condition, delta and beta band power increased in the temporo-central ROI. The current study suggested two main patterns of frequency band modulation during the execution of a motor compared with the cognitive synchronization task while a person is focusing the attention on one's breath. This study can be considered as the first attempt to classify the different effects of interoceptive manipulation on motor and cognitive synchronization tasks using neurophysiological measures.

Inter-Brain Hemodynamic Coherence Applied to Interoceptive Attentiveness in Hyperscanning: Why Social Framing Matters

“…01, η 2 = 0.498). The pairwise comparison revealed an increase in coherence of the O2Hb values in the focus condition for both tasks (motor and cognitive) in the left compared with the right hemisphere (motor: F [1,15] Then, a third interaction effect was found for condition × task × lateralization × frame (F [1, 82] = 7.89, p = 0.01, η 2 = 0.432). A pairwise comparison revealed an increase in coherence in the left hemisphere when the participants in the focus condition performed the motor synchronization task with a social frame compared with no social frame (F [1, 15] = 8.98, p = 0.01, η 2 = 0.408) (Figure 4A).…”

“…Previously, single-brain studies were carried out to investigate the neural correlates of IA manipulation (operationalized as focused on breathing) on the inter-personal synchronization necessary for performing joint tasks [12][13][14][15]. In two recent studies, functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) was used to record the oxygenated hemoglobin (O2Hb) changes during joint tasks involving motor and cognitive synchronization, while the participants were required to concentrate on their breathing to better understand the hemodynamic correlates of IA manipulation in interpersonal synchronization [12,14].…”

Social Interoception and Autonomic System Reactivity during Synchronization Behavior

“…In fact, interoception has been now widely demonstrated to play a role not only in processes that concern the individual and his body as well as in a range of social phenomena such as the differentiation between the self and the other [ 10 ], social cognition [ 11 ], loneliness and relatedness [ 12 ] and empathic responses [ 13 ]. In line with these studies, it has been recently demonstrated how IA can impact on the neural correlates implicated in basic interpersonal synchronization tasks [ 8 , 9 , 14 ]. For instance, when a joint task is performed and the individual focuses on his/her physiological body reactions, the brain hemodynamic correlates are “boosted” in neuroanatomical regions that support sustained attention, reorientation of attention, social responsiveness, and synchronization (i.e., the prefrontal cortex, PFC) [ 8 ].…”

“…Thirdly, it may be expected to observe such significant differences in autonomic reactivity especially when participants will be performing the motor as opposed to the linguistic synchronization task given the effect of the social frame we previously observed specifically for the motor synchronization task in our previous research [ 14 ].…”

“…On the other hand, the right PFC was shown to be more involved when an explicit focus on the breath was induced during the cognitive linguistic task requiring synchronization with a partner: interestingly, this right lateralized effect was not significant for the motor task [ 9 ]. In addition, two main patterns of electrophysiological frequency band modulation related to mental concentration, coordinated, and controlled motor activity were found during the execution of a motor compared to cognitive synchronization task while a person is focusing the attention on one’s breath [ 14 ].…”