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Is performance on probed serial recall tasks in schizophrenia related to duration of Attentional Blink?

ABSTRACT: Schizophrenia is associated with a deficit in working memory, with the degree of working memory impairment related to the level of social and occupational functioning. This study tests the hypothesis that the working memory deficits in individuals with schizophrenia can be explained by slow processing of visual stimuli, as measured by the attentional blink (AB) task. Individuals with schizophrenia (SC) and controls (HC) were recruited from an early intervention service for psychosis and the local community. Data from 16 SC (11M/5F, mean = 26.4 yo) and 20 age-matched HC (11M/9F, mean = 25.8 yo) were analyzed. Each subject performed an AB task to determine their AB duration, defined as the lag to reach their plateau performance (ltpp). As expected, mean AB duration in the SC group (575 ms) was significantly slower than HC (460 ms; p = 0.007). Recall accuracy of the SC group on a working memory task, a 6-item probed serial recall task (PSR), was reduced compared to the HC group at a standard interstimulus interval (ISI) (p = 0.002). When the individual's AB duration was then used to adjust the ISI on the PSR task to three relative ISI rates (Slow (2 × ltpp), Medium (ltpp) and Fast (1/2 × ltpp)), performance on the PSR task was affected by group, position and ISI and qualified by an ISI ∗ position (p = 0.001) and a trend to a triple interaction (p = 0.054). There was main effect of group at all ISIs, but group ∗ position interaction only at Slow ISI (p = 0.01). Our interpretation of the results is that absolute ISI, rather than ISI relative to AB duration, affected performance.

SUBMITTER: McAllindon DP

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5514299 | biostudies-other | 2017 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-other

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Project description:Whereas subcortical structures such as the basal ganglia have been widely explored in relation to motor control, recent evidence suggests that their mechanisms extend to the domain of attentional switching. We here investigated the subcortical involvement in reward related top-down control of visual alpha-band oscillations (8-13 Hz), which have been consistently linked to mechanisms supporting the allocation of visuospatial attention. Given that items associated with contextual saliency (e.g., monetary reward or loss) attract attention, it is not surprising that the acquired salience of visual items further modulates. The executive networks controlling such reward-dependent modulations of oscillatory brain activity have yet to be fully elucidated. Although such networks have been explored in terms of corticocortical interactions, subcortical regions are likely to be involved. To uncover this, we combined MRI and MEG data from 17 male and 11 female participants, investigating whether derived measures of subcortical structural asymmetries predict interhemispheric modulation of alpha power during a spatial attention task. We show that volumetric hemispheric lateralization of globus pallidus (GP) and thalamus (Th) explains individual hemispheric biases in the ability to modulate posterior alpha power. Importantly, for the GP, this effect became stronger when the value saliency parings in the task increased. Our findings suggest that the GP and Th in humans are part of a subcortical executive control network, differentially involved in modulating posterior alpha activity in the presence of saliency. Further investigation aimed at uncovering the interaction between subcortical and neocortical attentional networks would provide useful insight in future studies.SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT Whereas the involvement of subcortical regions into higher level cognitive processing, such as attention and reward attribution, has been already indicated in previous studies, little is known about its relationship with the functional oscillatory underpinnings of said processes. In particular, interhemispheric modulation of alpha band (8-13 Hz) oscillations, as recorded with magnetoencephalography, has been previously shown to vary as a function of salience (i.e., monetary reward/loss) in a spatial attention task. We here provide novel insights into the link between subcortical and cortical control of visual attention. Using the same reward-related spatial attention paradigm, we show that the volumetric lateralization of subcortical structures (specifically globus pallidus and thalamus) explains individual biases in the modulation of visual alpha activity.

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Is performance on probed serial recall tasks in schizophrenia related to duration of Attentional Blink?

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