Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience最新文献

{"title":"Behavioral tests for the assessment of social hierarchy in mice.","authors":"Hao Zheng, Dantong Chen, Zilong Zhong, Ziyi Li, Meng Yuan, Zhenkun Zhang, Xiaoping Zhou, Guohui Zhu, Hongwei Sun, Lin Sun","doi":"10.3389/fnbeh.2025.1549666","DOIUrl":"10.3389/fnbeh.2025.1549666","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Social hierarchy refers to the set of social ranks in a group of animals where individuals can gain priority access to resources through repeated social interactions. Key mechanisms involved in this process include conflict, social negotiation, prior experience, and physical advantages. The establishment and maintenance of social hierarchies not only promote group stability and well-being but also shape individual social behaviors by fostering cooperation and reducing conflict. Existing research indicates that social hierarchy is closely associated with immune responses, neural regulation, metabolic processes, and endocrine functions. These physiological systems collectively modulate an individual's sensitivity to stress and influence adaptive responses, thereby playing a critical role in the development of psychiatric disorders such as depression and anxiety. This review summarizes the primary behavioral methods used to assess social dominance in mice, evaluates their applicability and limitations, and discusses potential improvements. Additionally, it explores the underlying neural mechanisms associated with these methods to deepen our understanding of their biological basis. By critically assessing existing methodologies and proposing refinements, this study aims to provide a systematic reference framework and methodological guidance for future research, facilitating a more comprehensive exploration of the neural mechanisms underlying social behavior. The role of sex differences in social hierarchy formation remains underexplored. Most studies focus predominantly on males, while the distinct social strategies and physiological mechanisms of females are currently overlooked. Future studies should place greater emphasis on evaluating social hierarchy in female mice to achieve a more comprehensive understanding of sex-specific social behaviors and their impact on group structure and individual health. Advances in automated tracking technologies may help address this gap by improving behavioral assessments in female mice. Future research may also benefit from integrating physiological data (e.g., hormone levels) to gain deeper insights into the relationships between social status, stress regulation, and mental health. Additionally, developments in artificial intelligence and deep learning could enhance individual recognition and behavioral analysis, potentially reducing reliance on chemical markers or implanted devices.</p>","PeriodicalId":12368,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience","volume":"19 ","pages":"1549666"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2025-03-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC11920152/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143662911","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Mild traumatic brain injury increases vulnerability to post-traumatic stress disorder in rats and the possible role of hippocampal DNA methylation.","authors":"Yujie Niu, Zhibiao Cai, Junkai Cheng, Jie Zhou, Xiaodong Qu, Changdong Li, Zhongjing Zhang, Shenghao Zhang, Yaqiang Nan, Qifeng Tang, Lei Zhang, Yelu Hao","doi":"10.3389/fnbeh.2025.1539028","DOIUrl":"10.3389/fnbeh.2025.1539028","url":null,"abstract":"<p><strong>Introduction: </strong>Clinical studies have established that patients with mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI) are at an increased risk for developing post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), suggesting that mTBI increases vulnerability to subsequent PTSD onset. However, preclinical animal studies investigating this link remain scarce, and the specific biological mechanism through which mTBI increases vulnerability to PTSD is largely unknown.</p><p><strong>Methods: </strong>In this study, we modeled mTBI in rats using a mild, closed-head, weight-drop injury, followed 72 h later by exposure to single prolonged stress (SPS) to simulate PTSD. Then, we investigated the impact of mTBI on subsequent PTSD development by observing the behaviors of rats in a series of validated behavioral tests and further explored the possible role of hippocampal DNA methylation.</p><p><strong>Results: </strong>We found that, compared with rats in the PTSD-only group, those in the mTBI + PTSD group exhibited higher anxiety levels, higher depression levels, and impaired spatial learning and memory as determined in the open field test, the forced swimming test, and the Morris water maze test, respectively. Rats in the mTBI + PTSD group also exhibited higher hippocampal DNMT3b protein expression compared with those in the PTSD group.</p><p><strong>Conclusion: </strong>In conclusion, our results demonstrated that mTBI increases vulnerability to PTSD in rats, possibly through alterations in hippocampal DNA methylation patterns.</p>","PeriodicalId":12368,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience","volume":"19 ","pages":"1539028"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2025-03-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC11911326/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143647885","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Robotic animals as new tools in rodent neuroscience research: proposed applications of zooinspired robots for mouse behavioral testing.","authors":"Raffaele d'Isa","doi":"10.3389/fnbeh.2025.1545352","DOIUrl":"10.3389/fnbeh.2025.1545352","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Bioinspired robots are machines which reproduce structural or functional features of a living organism. In particular, the bioinspired robots which reproduce features of animals can be more specifically defined as zooinspired robots. Currently, the applications of animal robots are various and range across different fields, such as, for instance, nature conservation, search and rescue of humans after natural or man-made disasters, exploration of extraterrestrial environments and robotic pets for elderly people under care for dementia. Several animal species have been imitated up to now, from lizards to butterflies, and from fish to dogs. Animal robots used to investigate the social behavior of an animal species through animal-robot interactions are called ethorobots. Intriguingly, ethorobots are able to reproduce in the laboratory behaviors that are generally produced spontaneously in nature and are difficult or impossible to evoke and modulate in captive animals, which makes these animal robots particularly useful tools for experimental ethology and ethological neuroscience. Rodents, primarily mice and rats, are the most common animal model in biomedical research. Coherently with the importance of these species for scientific research, robotic mice and rats have been attracting increasing efforts in bioinspired robotics over the course of the past five decades. The technological advancement of animal robots will make their employment for scientific research increasingly useful. However, clear experimental applications of animal robots should be identified in order to challenge engineers to design robots that can serve these experimental scopes. In the present work, we will describe possible practical applications of robotic animals for mouse behavioral testing across six different behavioral domains, namely courtship, parental care, antipredatory behavior, helping behavior, predation and territory defense-related aggression. In particular, we will outline how robotic animals could be employed to interact with living mice in a series of specific tests of social behavior. Finally, in the conclusion we will consider the ethical and epistemological advantages of the use of robotic animals in behavioral neuroscience. Indeed, robotic animals can benefit scientific research on social behaviors both in terms of optimized animal welfare of the tested subjects and of extended opportunities of experimental designing due to an unprecedented control over the independent variables.</p>","PeriodicalId":12368,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience","volume":"19 ","pages":"1545352"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2025-02-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC11891199/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143596632","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Vagal heart rate variability during rapid eye movement sleep reduces negative memory bias.","authors":"Allison B Morehouse, Katharine C Simon, Pin-Chun Chen, Sara C Mednick","doi":"10.3389/fnbeh.2025.1513655","DOIUrl":"10.3389/fnbeh.2025.1513655","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Emotional memories change over time, but the mechanisms supporting this change are not well understood. Sleep has been identified as one mechanism that supports memory consolidation, with sleep selectively benefitting negative emotional consolidation at the expense of neutral memories, with specific oscillatory events linked to this process. In contrast, the consolidation of neutral and positive memories, compared to negative memories, has been associated with increased vagally mediated heart rate variability (HRV) during wakefulness. However, how HRV during sleep contributes to emotional memory consolidation remains unexplored. We investigated how sleep oscillations (i.e., sleep spindles) and vagal activity during sleep contribute to the consolidation of neutral and negative memories. Using a double-blind, placebo-controlled, within-subject, cross-over design, we examined the impact of pharmacological vagal suppression using zolpidem on overnight emotional memory consolidation. Thirty-three participants encoded neutral and negative pictures in the morning, followed by picture recognition tests before and after a night of sleep. Zolpidem or placebo was administered in the evening before overnight sleep, and participants were monitored with electroencephalography and electrocardiography. In the placebo condition, greater overnight improvement for neutral pictures was associated with higher vagal HRV in both Non-Rapid Eye Movement Slow Wave Sleep (NREM SWS) and REM. Additionally, the emotional memory tradeoff (i.e., difference between consolidation of neutral versus negative memories) was associated with higher vagal HRV during REM, but in this case, neutral memories were remembered better than negative memories, indicating a potential role for REM vagal HRV in promoting a positive memory bias overnight. Zolpidem, on the other hand, reduced vagal HRV during SWS, increased NREM spindle activity, and eliminated the positive memory bias. Lastly, we used stepwise linear mixed effects regression to determine how NREM spindle activity and vagal HRV during REM independently explained the variance in the emotional memory tradeoff effect. We found that the addition of vagal HRV in combination with spindle activity significantly improved the model's fit. Overall, our results suggest that sleep brain oscillations and vagal signals synergistically interact in the overnight consolidation of emotional memories, with REM vagal HRV critically contributing to the positive memory bias.</p>","PeriodicalId":12368,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience","volume":"19 ","pages":"1513655"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2025-02-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC11891210/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143596634","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Efficacy of vigorous physical activity as an intervention for mitigating depressive symptoms in adolescents and young adults: a comprehensive systematic review and meta-analysis.","authors":"Wei Yang, Huijing Chen, Wei Liu, Sheng Qu, Yao Ge, Jin Song","doi":"10.3389/fnbeh.2025.1479326","DOIUrl":"10.3389/fnbeh.2025.1479326","url":null,"abstract":"<p><strong>Purpose: </strong>This study aimed to evaluate the effectiveness of vigorous physical activity as an intervention for alleviating depressive symptoms among adolescents and young adults.</p><p><strong>Methods: </strong>A comprehensive search on systematically reliable databases was carried out, and studies running till August 2023 were considered in this study. The articles included in this meta-analysis assessed the impact of exercise interventions on depressive symptomatology in adolescents and young adults. Two independent investigators screened the studies, extracted data, and evaluated quality.</p><p><strong>Results: </strong>Physical activity produced an important reduction in depressive symptoms [SMD] = -4.23, 95% CI: -7.02, -1.44, <i>p</i> = 0.0001; a moderate effect size in both the adolescent population with clinical depression and adolescents who presented with subclinical depressive symptoms. Notably, vigorous physical exercise worked most favorably for adolescent depressive symptomatology, while moderate-intensity exercise was the best choice for adolescents with diagnosed clinical depression.</p><p><strong>Conclusion: </strong>This meta-analysis suggests that vigorous physical activity could reduce depressive symptoms in adolescents and young adults. However, further studies are needed to provide clearer recommendations regarding the type, duration, and intensity of exercise necessary to treat clinical depression in this population.</p>","PeriodicalId":12368,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience","volume":"19 ","pages":"1479326"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2025-02-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC11876554/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143556337","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Neural correlates and plasticity of explicit emotion regulation following the experience of trauma.","authors":"Annika C Konrad, Andrei C Miu, Sebastian Trautmann, Philipp Kanske","doi":"10.3389/fnbeh.2025.1523035","DOIUrl":"10.3389/fnbeh.2025.1523035","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Experiencing trauma or other adverse life events is highly prevalent and poses a significant risk for the development of mental disorders. Understanding the underlying mechanisms and neural processes involved in trauma processing is crucial for both prevention and targeting symptoms. Especially, difficulties in emotion regulation emerge as one key mechanism implicated in the development of conditions such as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) following traumatic experiences. However, neural correlates of explicit emotion regulation among individuals who have undergone trauma have not received much attention. Understanding the neural basis of dysregulated emotion following trauma could reveal important details about how trauma interferes with emotional regulation systems, informing the development of more specific intervention approaches. Therefore, this mini review summarizes current research, and identifies relevant gaps in the literature and challenges for future studies. Specifically, it provides an overview of the neural dysregulation associated with explicit emotion regulation strategies such as reappraisal or suppression. Finally, it highlights promising findings from intervention studies targeting emotion regulation, such as trauma-focused exposure therapy and neurofeedback, indicating neural plasticity in individuals with traumatic experiences. Hereby, this review aims to bridge the gap between fundamental and intervention research and highlights future directions for translational research.</p>","PeriodicalId":12368,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience","volume":"19 ","pages":"1523035"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2025-02-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC11865028/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143522918","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Assessing cognitive flexibility in mice using a custom-built touchscreen chamber.","authors":"Rui C Pais, Ali Goldani, Jayden Hutchison, Amirhossein Mazrouei, Mostafa Khavaninzadeh, Leonardo A Molina, Robert J Sutherland, Majid H Mohajerani","doi":"10.3389/fnbeh.2025.1536458","DOIUrl":"10.3389/fnbeh.2025.1536458","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Automated touchscreen systems have become increasingly prevalent in rodent model screening. This technology has significantly enhanced cognitive and behavioral assessments in mice and has bridged the translational gap between basic research using rodent models and human clinical research. Our study introduces a custom-built touchscreen operant conditioning chamber powered by a Raspberry Pi and a commercially available computer tablet, which effectively addresses the significant cost barriers traditionally associated with this technology. In order to test our prototype, we decided to train C57BL/6 mice on a visual discrimination serial-reversal task, and both C57BL/6 and App^NL-G-Fstrain - an Alzheimer's Disease (AD) mouse model - on a new location discrimination serial-reversal task. The results demonstrated a clear progression toward asymptotic performance, particularly in the location discrimination task, which also revealed potential genotype-specific deficits, with App^NL-G-F mice displaying an increase in the average number of errors in the first reversal as well as in perseverative errors, compared to wild-type mice. These results validate the practical utility of our touchscreen apparatus and underline its potential to provide insights into the behavioral and cognitive markers of neurobiological disorders.</p>","PeriodicalId":12368,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience","volume":"19 ","pages":"1536458"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2025-02-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC11865062/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143522912","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"NRBF2 plays a crucial role in the acquisition process of learning and memory, independent of the Vps34 complex.","authors":"Songfen Wu, Haicai Zhuang, Xidan Zhou, Kuan Li","doi":"10.3389/fnbeh.2025.1529522","DOIUrl":"10.3389/fnbeh.2025.1529522","url":null,"abstract":"<p><strong>Introduction: </strong>NRBF2, a component of autophagy-associated PIK3C3/VPS34-containing phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase complex, plays a crucial role in learning and memory processes, yet its specific impact on memory and the underlying molecular mechanisms remains unclear.</p><p><strong>Methods: </strong>Here, we utilized NRBF2 knockout mice to examine its influence on the time course of fear memory. Employing quantitative PCR, Western blot analysis, behavioral tests, and electrophysiology, we investigated the mechanisms through which NRBF2 affects memory processing.</p><p><strong>Results: </strong>We observed an increase in <i>Nrbf2</i> mRNA levels at 6 and 12 h, and protein levels at 6 h post fear conditioning. Depletion of NRBF2 impaired memory acquisition, short-term, and long-term memory without causing any anxiety-like behavior. Interestingly, inhibition of Vps34 and autophagy by SAR405 disrupted fear memory consolidation, while leaving memory acquisition, short-term memory, and long-term potentiation (LTP) unaffected. Our results suggested that NRBF2 deletion impaired memory acquisition through an autophagy-independent pathway and provided novel insights into the role of NRBF2 in the central nervous system.</p><p><strong>Discussion: </strong>This study offer new insights into the role of NRBF2 and highlight the potential of targeting NRBF2 as a therapeutic strategy for addressing cognitive deficits associated with various disorders.</p>","PeriodicalId":12368,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience","volume":"19 ","pages":"1529522"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2025-02-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC11861080/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143515101","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Olfaction-based learned preference assessment without the use of motivational fear or motivational weight loss.","authors":"Sara E Moss, Ekaterina S McCurdy, Natalya N Thomas, Danielle Gulick, Angela M Poff, Dominic P D'Agostino","doi":"10.3389/fnbeh.2025.1521751","DOIUrl":"10.3389/fnbeh.2025.1521751","url":null,"abstract":"<p><strong>Introduction: </strong>Reliable assessments of learning ability in preclinical models are essential for studying neurodegenerative, developmental, and inflammatory disorders. However, many inbred strains of mice present background pathologies that interfere with traditional learning tests. The C57BL/6 J mouse, a widely used laboratory strain, sporadically develops auditory and visual impairments that complicate interpretation. In this study, we establish an olfaction-based learned preference protocol designed to evaluate learning ability independent of fear responses, motivational weight loss, or visual cues in C57BL/6 J mice.</p><p><strong>Methods and results: </strong>Leveraging the species' natural preference for sweet flavors, we tested different sweeteners and confirmed their passive preference for sucrose was more robust than for saccharin or sucralose. We then trained mice to associate either lemon or rose scents with a sucrose paste reward, and tested whether they demonstrated a learned preference for the sucrose-associated scent over the neutral scent. Mice developed an appetitive olfactory preference for sucrose as a reward, in the absence of motivational weight loss, as measured by time spent exploring a three-chamber association box with access to both scents. We assessed whether this protocol discriminated learning deficit induced by lipopolysaccharide (LPS) administration.</p><p><strong>Conclusion: </strong>We conclude that this protocol is a viable tool for assessing learning abilities in preclinical models with auditory or visual deficits, motor impairments, or an inability to tolerate motivational weight loss.</p>","PeriodicalId":12368,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience","volume":"19 ","pages":"1521751"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2025-02-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC11861198/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143515105","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Impact of virtual agent facial emotions and attention on N170 ERP amplitude: comparative study.","authors":"Luisa Kirasirova, Olga Maslova, Vasiliy Pyatin","doi":"10.3389/fnbeh.2025.1523705","DOIUrl":"10.3389/fnbeh.2025.1523705","url":null,"abstract":"<p><strong>Introduction: </strong>It is known from the literature that face perception of virtual agents affects the amplitude and latency of the ERP components. However, sensitivity of the N170 component to virtual agent facial emotions, and level of attention to facial emotional expressions were not investigated in the virtual reality environment by now, which was the aim of our study.</p><p><strong>Methods: </strong>EEG recording, 2D and 3D visual testing of the neutral, happy and disgusted facial emotions of virtual agents were used. The protocol consisted of three sessions in the attentional condition of participants to each facial emotion (passive, active, and active to neutral facial emotional expression). The amplitudes of the N170 ERP were also reflected in the comparative analysis between 2D and VR.</p><p><strong>Results: </strong>In the context of virtual agent facial emotional expressions, we identified the following dynamics of the N170 amplitude: attention (passive/active) showed no signaling effect; active attention to neutral virtual agent facial emotions reduced the N170 amplitude; significant interactions were observed between the factors \"emotion × attention\" and \"environment × attention,\" but no interaction was found among all three factors.</p><p><strong>Conclusion: </strong>The immersive quality of the environment in which visual and emotional events are presented has a less pronounced effect on early-stage facial processing at N170 amplitude. Thus, our findings indicate that the N170 amplitude is primarily modulated by the emotional content and attention directed to virtual agent facial emotional expressions.</p>","PeriodicalId":12368,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience","volume":"19 ","pages":"1523705"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2025-02-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC11847822/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143491463","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}