Pretrial Theta Band Activity Affects Context-dependent Modulation of Response Inhibition

Abstract

The ability to inhibit a prepotent response is a crucial prerequisite of goal-directed behavior. So far, research on response inhibition has mainly examined these processes when there is little to no cognitive control during the decision to respond. We manipulated the “context” in which response inhibition has to be exerted (i.e., a controlled or an automated context) by combining a Simon task with a go/no-go task and focus on theta-band activity. To investigate the role of “context” in response inhibition, we also examined how far theta-band activity in the pretrial period modulates context-dependent variations of theta-band activity during response inhibition. This was done in an EEG study applying beamforming methods. Here, we examined n = 43 individuals. We show that an automated context, as opposed to a controlled context, compromises response inhibition performance and increases the need for cognitive control. This was also related to context-dependent modulations of theta-band activity in superior frontal and middle frontal regions. Of note, results showed that theta-band activity in the pretrial period, associated with the right inferior frontal cortex, was substantially correlated with context-dependent modulations of theta-band activity during response inhibition. The direction of the obtained correlation provides insights into the functional relevance of a pretrial theta-band activity. The data suggest that pretrial theta-band activity reflects some form of attentional sampling to inform possible upcoming processes signaling the need for cognitive control.

On the Role of Stimulus-Response Context in Inhibitory Control in Alcohol Use Disorder

“…On the other hand, a significantly higher overall accuracy in incongruent trials (96.15% ± 0.38) than in congruent trials (94.60% ± 0.48) was found in the Nogo condition ( t = −6.087, p = 0.002). These results were also confirmed by additional Wilcoxon signed-rank tests for Go ( z = −3.049, p = 0.004) and Nogo trials ( z = −5.234, p = 0.002) and align with previous findings using the same experimental paradigm on healthy participants [ 21 , 23 ].…”

“…To measure the effect of automatic vs. controlled processes on response inhibition, an integration of Simon and Go/Nogo paradigms was used ( Figure 1 ) [ 22 , 23 , 43 ].…”

“…To this end, we used a relatively recently developed experimental paradigm combining the Simon task and the Go/Nogo task, which allows the examination of the interplay of controlled and automated processing during goal-directed actions [ 21 , 22 , 23 ]. For the Simon task, the dual-route model [ 24 ] states that conflicts arise due to competing automatic and controlled (response) selection processes.…”

“…This interplay of the so-called direct (automatic) route and the indirect (controlled) route is essential to explain behavior: In congruent trials, the direct route is sufficient for correct responding, but, in incongruent trials, the indirect route also needs to be activated to ‘control’ the direct route. When processing via the direct route dominates, response inhibition becomes harder and more error-prone, ultimately resulting in more inhibition failures in congruent trials compared with incongruent trials, where the indirect (controlled) route already exerts some control over the direct (automatic) route [ 21 , 23 , 25 ]. As a consequence of these mechanisms, the “regular” Simon effect is characterized by better behavioral performance in congruent than in incongruent Go trials.…”

Evidence for independent representational contents in inhibitory control subprocesses associated with frontoparietal cortices

“…In incongruent Simon trials, the automatic and controlled routes are activated and induce a conflict (Chmielewski & Beste, 2017 ; Hommel, 2011 ; Keye et al, 2013 ), which increases the contribution of controlled response selection processes. Using a Simon‐Go/Nogo task, it has been shown that there is a lower rate of false alarms (i.e., erroneous responses in Nogo trials) when a Nogo stimulus is embedded in incongruent than congruent Simon task trials (Chmielewski et al, 2018 ; Chmielewski et al, 2020 ; Chmielewski & Beste, 2017 ; Opitz et al, 2019 ; Wendiggensen et al, 2022 ). Previous studies investigated the neural dynamics underlying the interplay of automatic and controlled processes during response inhibition (Chmielewski et al, 2018 ; Chmielewski et al, 2020 ; Chmielewski & Beste, 2017 ; Opitz et al, 2019 ; Wendiggensen et al, 2022 ).…”