Eye blinks are related to auditory information processing: evidence from a complex speech perception task

Abstract

There is increasing evidence that spontaneous eye blinks are related to mental states and can predict performance in certain tasks because of their relation to dopaminergic activity. Moreover, it has been shown that eye blinks while performing visual tasks are preferably executed not before all available information and even the manual response has been processed and given. Thus, blinks provide a natural endpoint of visual information processing. In the present study, we investigate to what degree such functional assignment of eye blinks also applies when only auditory stimuli are processed. For that, we present blink analyses on data of an auditory stock price monitoring task to examine the timing and frequency of blinks relative to the temporal dynamics of the task and different kinds of available cues. Our results show that blinks are meaningfully rather than randomly paced, although no visual information has to be processed. Blinks are significantly accelerated if a no-go trial is indicated which made all the subsequent information irrelevant. Although the stimuli were exclusively auditory, blinks were mostly inhibited during stimulus presentation. Taken together, blinks depend on the information being presented and mark a distinct point in time at which this information is conclusively processed. These findings deliver further support for the usefulness of eyeblink analyses, independently of the modality of the information being processed.

The latency of spontaneous eye blinks marks relevant visual and auditory information processing

“…Blink probability is reduced during the presentation of important sensory information and is increased after the offset of the sensory input ( Bonneh, Adini, & Polat, 2016 ; Cong, Sharikadze, Staude, Deubel, & Wolf, 2010 ; Hoppe, Helfmann, & Rothkopf, 2018 ; Oh, Jeong, & Jeong, 2012 ; Siegle, Ichikawa, & Steinhauer, 2008 ; Wascher, Heppner, Möckel, Kobald, & Getzmann, 2015 ). This is also true for the auditory domain ( Bauer, Strock, Goldstein, Stern, & Walrath, 1985 ; Kobald, Wascher, Heppner, & Getzmann, 2019 ; Oh, Jeong, et al, 2012 ). In most of these studies, the sensory input was task relevant, and the effects of task-relevant factors and the sensory offset coincided with a task-related motor response.…”

The Latency of Spontaneous Eye Blinks Marks Relevant Visual and Auditory Information Processing

“…Indeed, it has been argued that the decrease in blinks is associated with attention to the input, where the subsequent increase in blinks marks the end of the attentional period i.e. when all information processing is complete (Kobald, et al 2019, Wascher, et al 2015. The suppression of blinks until its release is possibly a result of attentional allocation to sensory input.…”

“…However, the decrease is not specific to the visual modality but has been observed during auditory tasks as well (Bauer, et al 1985, Kobald, et al 2019 and the overall duration of a stimulus has been found to increase the duration of blink suppression in both domains (Bauer, et al 1985, Oh, Jeong and. This suggests a domain independent mechanism.…”

“…It has further been shown that blinks are modulated around the motor output (Bauer, et al 1985, Goldstein, Bauer and Stern 1992, Oh, Han, et al 2012 and can be entrained to the motor response even when participants engage in self-paced rhythmic finger tapping without external sensory cues (Cong, et al 2010). Nevertheless, motor aspects seem not to be the sole influence on blink occurrence since blinks have been shown to be modulated even during no-go trials (Kobald, et al 2019, Wascher, et al 2015.…”

“…To this end, we independently manipulated task irrelevant and task relevant sensory input during a comparable auditory and visual task, and considered the motor output as well as more cognitive influences related to the task performance. We specifically focused on the temporal effects on blinking behavior by looking at the blink latencies, a measure which has been used previously to detect influences on blinking (Doughty 2001, Fogarty and Stern 1989, Goldstein, Bauer and Stern 1992, Kobald, et al 2019.…”