Functional hemispheric asymmetries during the planning and manual control of virtual avatar movements

Abstract

Both hemispheres contribute to motor control beyond the innervation of the contralateral alpha motoneurons. The left hemisphere has been associated with higher-order aspects of motor control like sequencing and temporal processing, the right hemisphere with the transformation of visual information to guide movements in space. In the visuomotor context, empirical evidence regarding the latter has been limited though the right hemisphere’s specialization for visuospatial processing is well-documented in perceptual tasks. This study operationalized temporal and spatial processing demands during visuomotor processing and investigated hemispheric asymmetries in neural activation during the unimanual control of a visual cursor by grip force. Functional asymmetries were investigated separately for visuomotor planning and online control during functional magnetic resonance imaging in 19 young, healthy, right-handed participants. The expected cursor movement was coded with different visual trajectories. During planning when spatial processing demands predominated, activity was right-lateralized in a hand-independent manner in the inferior temporal lobe, occipito-parietal border, and ventral premotor cortex. When temporal processing demands overweighed spatial demands, BOLD responses during planning were left-lateralized in the temporo-parietal junction. During online control of the cursor, right lateralization was not observed. Instead, left lateralization occurred in the intraparietal sulcus. Our results identify movement phase and spatiotemporal demands as important determinants of dynamic hemispheric asymmetries during visuomotor processing. We suggest that, within a bilateral visuomotor network, the right hemisphere exhibits a processing preference for planning global spatial movement features whereas the left hemisphere preferentially times local features of visual movement trajectories and adjusts movement online.

Handedness Does Not Impact Inhibitory Control, but Movement Execution and Reactive Inhibition Are More under a Left-Hemisphere Control

“…In fact, reactive but not proactive inhibition seems to be computed mainly by the left hemisphere. Our findings are in line with evidence showing a left-hemispheric dominance in some aspects of movement control [82][83][84][85], including inhibition [50].…”

“…It is known that right-handers execute movements faster with the right than with the left hand [73][74][75], especially when an online movement correction is required [71,83]. These results have been interpreted in light of a greater specialization of the left hemisphere for controlling the magnitude and timing of muscular forces during movement execution [83][84][85]. According to our data, such functional asymmetry is not linked to participants' handedness, but it reflects a general function of the left hemisphere.…”

Laterality in Children: Evidence for Task-Dependent Lateralization of Motor Functions

“…It is worth noting that our results cannot be ascribed to better visuomotor adaptations due to a fine coordinative specific training on dominant hand [63], as the fine motor tasks we used were unfamiliar to participants. An interesting perspective may emerge when investigating the role of differentiated bimanual manipulation during developmental ages [64], analyzing spatio-temporal processes [65] while performing simple and complex fine motor tasks…”

The Effect of Double Biofeedback on Functional Hemispheric Asymmetry and Activity: A Pilot Study

“…Currently the assumption of the dynamic nature of functional hemispheric asymmetry is widely accepted (Floegel & Kell, 2017).…”

“…Other terms that are used to refer to what we call functional hemispheric asymmetry are functional connectivity of hemispheres (Watson et al, 2019), asymmetry of hemispheric network topology (Sun et al, 2017), functional hemispheric asymmetries (Floegel & Kell, 2017), hemispheric functional equivalence (Stanković & Nešić, 2020), hemispheric asymmetry of functional brain networks (Cao et al, 2020).…”