Cerebral cortexPub Date : 2025-05-01DOI: 10.1093/cercor/bhaf103
Sina A Schwarze, Corinna Laube, Neda Khosravani, Ulman Lindenberger, Silvia A Bunge, Yana Fandakova
{"title":"Intensive task-switching training and single-task training differentially affect behavioral and neural manifestations of cognitive control in children.","authors":"Sina A Schwarze, Corinna Laube, Neda Khosravani, Ulman Lindenberger, Silvia A Bunge, Yana Fandakova","doi":"10.1093/cercor/bhaf103","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/cercor/bhaf103","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>The ability to flexibly switch between tasks develops during childhood. Children's task-switching performance improves with practice, but the underlying processes remain unclear. We used functional magnetic resonance imaging to examine how 9 weeks of task-switching training affect performance and task-related activation and functional connectivity. Children (8-11 years) were assigned to one of three groups: intensive task switching (SW; n = 72), intensive single tasking (SI; n = 74), and passive control (n = 41). While mixing costs decreased in both training groups initially, only the SW group maintained these training-related improvements at the end of training. Activation in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex decreased with training, but again only the SW group maintained these activation decreases at the end of training. Condition-specific connectivity increases with task switching became less pronounced with training, especially in the SI group. Lower costs of task switching along with decreased task-related activations suggest increased processing efficiency in frontoparietal regions with training. Intensive task-switching training was associated with sustained changes, possibly facilitated by a greater mismatch between processing supplies and environmental demands. Our findings suggest that experience-dependent changes with intensive task-switching training do not mirror maturational processes but rather facilitate performance via more efficient task processing.</p>","PeriodicalId":9715,"journal":{"name":"Cerebral cortex","volume":"35 5","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.9,"publicationDate":"2025-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC12078935/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144076173","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Cerebral cortexPub Date : 2025-05-01DOI: 10.1093/cercor/bhaf113
Tetsuo Kida, Emi Tanaka, Koji Inui
{"title":"Finger and nerve selectivity of an early somatic-motor interaction: a magnetoencephalogram study.","authors":"Tetsuo Kida, Emi Tanaka, Koji Inui","doi":"10.1093/cercor/bhaf113","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/cercor/bhaf113","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Voluntary movements of individual or multiple body parts selectively modulate cortical responsiveness to sensory inputs depending on the task requirement. It remains unclear whether this selectivity of the somatic-motor interaction in the cerebral cortex is complete or gradient along the surface of the body part and varies with task characteristics. We herein used magnetoencephalograms to investigate the selectivity of the somatic-motor interactive modulation of somatosensory evoked cortical responses during self-paced movements of individual fingers (digits 1 to 5) or dynamic self-paced tapping or static pinching movements of two fingers (digits 1 and 2). The source strength of the cortical response at 35 ms post-stimulus contralateral to a stimulation, M35c, selectively decreased when the finger innervated by the stimulated nerve was individually moved. Furthermore, dynamic tapping and static pinching movements of two fingers exerted different effects on the strength of M35c. Therefore, the present study demonstrates the involvement of finger and nerve specificity in the somatic-motor functional interaction at the early cortical stage and its task-dependent flexibility.</p>","PeriodicalId":9715,"journal":{"name":"Cerebral cortex","volume":"35 5","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.9,"publicationDate":"2025-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144092799","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Cerebral cortexPub Date : 2025-05-01DOI: 10.1093/cercor/bhaf115
Marjolein Mues, Avantika Mathur, James Booth
{"title":"Examining the role of phonological and semantic mechanisms during morphological processing of sentences in 7-year-old children.","authors":"Marjolein Mues, Avantika Mathur, James Booth","doi":"10.1093/cercor/bhaf115","DOIUrl":"10.1093/cercor/bhaf115","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Morphology refers to the smallest difference in sound that makes a difference in meaning, such as walk versus walked. Morphological skill is a key linguistic feature that impacts language and literacy outcomes, but its neural underpinnings have mostly been examined at the word level. We examined if phonological and semantic mechanisms play a role during morphological processing in sentences in 7-year-old children using functional MRI. Using a novel functional localizer approach that correlates brain activation during sound and meaning in-scanner tasks with standardized scores for phonology and semantics, we show that morphological processing is especially reliant on phonological mechanisms given significant activation in the left dorsal inferior frontal gyrus and left posterior superior temporal gyrus. Semantic mechanisms were engaged to a lesser degree in the left ventral inferior frontal gyrus. Exploratory whole-brain analyses revealed a brain-behavior correlation in the cerebellum showing that greater activation during morphological processing was related to lower language abilities. Our results suggest that processing morphological structures in sentences relies mostly on phonemic segmentation, and that those with lower language may compensate for their lower phonological skill by engaging the cerebellum to amplify and refine those phonemic representations to aid in segmentation when listening to sentences.</p>","PeriodicalId":9715,"journal":{"name":"Cerebral cortex","volume":"35 5","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.9,"publicationDate":"2025-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC12075772/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143964639","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Cerebral cortexPub Date : 2025-05-01DOI: 10.1093/cercor/bhaf087
Mina Elhamiasl, Maeve R Boylan, Ryan Barry-Anwar, Zoe Pestana, Andreas Keil, Lisa S Scott
{"title":"Infant dominant rhythm desynchronization to faces and objects.","authors":"Mina Elhamiasl, Maeve R Boylan, Ryan Barry-Anwar, Zoe Pestana, Andreas Keil, Lisa S Scott","doi":"10.1093/cercor/bhaf087","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/cercor/bhaf087","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Infants' electroencephalography (EEG) dominant rhythm oscillates between 6 and 9 Hz. The desynchronization of this rhythm from baseline to the processing of visual stimuli is used as an index to better understand the development of visual attention. However, development trajectories of desynchronization remain underexplored. Additionally, it is unclear whether development of desynchronization is sensitive to task demands or if it reflects broader developmental changes. To investigate these questions, EEG data were collected from infants aged 6, 9, and 12 months while they passively viewed a fixation cross followed by 10-s trials of a female face or novel object tracked down the screen. Dominant rhythm desynchronization was calculated by subtracting power during the fixation period from power during each task condition. The results revealed significant desynchronization in response to faces at occipital electrodes for all age groups. The magnitude of the desynchronization also increased from 6 to 9 to 12 months of age in response to faces over right occipital electrodes. No significant desynchronization was observed for object stimuli. These findings suggest that dominant rhythm desynchronization develops across infancy and is sensitive to stimulus type. The increased desynchronization for faces compared to objects highlights infants' general preference for faces relative to objects.</p>","PeriodicalId":9715,"journal":{"name":"Cerebral cortex","volume":"35 5","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.9,"publicationDate":"2025-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143978569","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Cerebral cortexPub Date : 2025-05-01DOI: 10.1093/cercor/bhaf085
Vianney Salvi, Gilles Courtand, Philippe de Deurwaerdère, Laura Cardoit, Stéphane Valerio, Sébastien Delcasso, François Georges, Thomas Michelet
{"title":"Cingulate cortex stimulation drives distinct pupillary responses in rat via recruitment of noradrenergic neurons in the locus coeruleus.","authors":"Vianney Salvi, Gilles Courtand, Philippe de Deurwaerdère, Laura Cardoit, Stéphane Valerio, Sébastien Delcasso, François Georges, Thomas Michelet","doi":"10.1093/cercor/bhaf085","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/cercor/bhaf085","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>The organization of the cingulate cortex has been the subject of intensive studies, concluding to its central role in motor control, cognition, and arousal. One of the key anatomical pathways through which the cingulate cortex influences behavior is its efferent connection to the locus coeruleus (LC). This brainstem region is responsible for noradrenaline (NA) release and is critical for various cognitive and behavioral functions. However, the specific impact of cingulate subregions on the LC-NA system remains unexplored. This study investigated how the different cingulate cortex areas affect LC-NA activity by measuring pupil-evoked responses (PERs) as an index of LC-NA activity. Using intra-cortical stimulation across the eight cingulate areas in rats, we found that anterior cingulate cortex and midcingulate cortex subregions evoked rare autonomic responses but significant pupil dilations whose amplitude increased along the caudo-rostral and dorso-ventral axes. By using the DSP-4, a neurotoxin-selective ablation of the LC-NA system, we suppressed PER and confirmed the role of LC-NA activity in this response. The differential influence of cortical areas on the PER demonstrates that each subregion of the rat cingulate cortex has the potential to differentially activate the LC-NA system, suggesting a clear parcellation of the rodent cingulate cortex, likely corresponding to functional specialization.</p>","PeriodicalId":9715,"journal":{"name":"Cerebral cortex","volume":"35 5","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.9,"publicationDate":"2025-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143968924","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Cerebral cortexPub Date : 2025-05-01DOI: 10.1093/cercor/bhaf104
Noelle R B Stiles, Jeiran Choupan, Hossein Ameri, Vivek R Patel, Yonggang Shi
{"title":"Visual cortical thickness increases with prolonged artificial vision restoration.","authors":"Noelle R B Stiles, Jeiran Choupan, Hossein Ameri, Vivek R Patel, Yonggang Shi","doi":"10.1093/cercor/bhaf104","DOIUrl":"10.1093/cercor/bhaf104","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>The Argus II retinal prosthesis restores visual perception to late blind individuals. It has been shown that structural changes occur in the brain due to late-onset blindness, including cortical thinning in visual cortical regions. Following vision restoration, it is not yet known whether visual regions are reinvigorated and regain a normal cortical thickness or retain the diminished thickness from blindness. We evaluated the cortical thicknesses of 10 Argus II participants, 10 blind participants, and 13 sighted participants. The Argus II patients on average had a thicker left cuneus cortex and lateral occipital cortex relative to the blind patients. The duration of the Argus II use significantly partially correlated with thicker visual cortical regions in the left hemisphere. Furthermore, in the 2 case studies (scanned before and after implantation), the patient with longer device use (44.5 months) had an increase in the cortical thickness of visual regions, whereas the shorter-using patient did not (6.5 months). Overall, the Argus II participants' cortical thickness was on average significantly rejuvenated in 2 higher visual regions, and participants using the implant for a longer duration had thicker visual regions. This research raises the possibility of structural plasticity reversing visual cortical atrophy in vision restoration participants.</p>","PeriodicalId":9715,"journal":{"name":"Cerebral cortex","volume":"35 5","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.9,"publicationDate":"2025-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143986196","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Cerebral cortexPub Date : 2025-05-01DOI: 10.1093/cercor/bhaf129
Kelong Lu, Xinyue Wang, Xinuo Qiao, Zhenni Gao, Ning Hao
{"title":"Group creativity emerges from triple ideation pathways: neurobehavioral evidence from an fNIRS hyperscanning study.","authors":"Kelong Lu, Xinyue Wang, Xinuo Qiao, Zhenni Gao, Ning Hao","doi":"10.1093/cercor/bhaf129","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/cercor/bhaf129","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>This study explored the origins of creative ideas in groups, validating the triple-pathway model of group creative ideation with behavioral and neuroscientific evidence. A total of 123 college student dyads completed a creative ideation task and a contrast task while their brain activity was simultaneously recorded using functional near-infrared spectroscopy. Results identified three distinct ideation pathways-flexibility, persistence, and convergence-that collectively drove group creativity, accompanied by three interbrain synchrony states. STATE2, characterized by enhanced prefrontal-temporal interbrain synchrony, positively predicted group creative performance, whereas STATE3, marked by reduced frontal-parietal interbrain synchrony, negatively predicted it. Specifically, STATE2 facilitated group creativity through three mediating pathways: (1) the flexibility pathway alone, (2) combined flexibility-persistence or flexibility-convergence pathways, and (3) a sequential flexibility-persistence-convergence pathway with chain mediation effects. These findings provide neurobehavioral evidence for the triple-pathway model, underscoring the pivotal role of prefrontal-temporal interbrain synchrony in group creativity. They further demonstrate the dynamic, multi-pathway nature of group creative ideation, showing that a single cohort can flexibly employ three interchangeable pathways to generate novel ideas collaboratively.</p>","PeriodicalId":9715,"journal":{"name":"Cerebral cortex","volume":"35 5","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.9,"publicationDate":"2025-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144156001","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Cerebral cortexPub Date : 2025-05-01DOI: 10.1093/cercor/bhaf108
Daeeun Kim, JuYoung Kim, Kun Il Kim, Hackjin Kim
{"title":"Navigating leadership dilemmas: neural mechanisms balancing social approval and group performance.","authors":"Daeeun Kim, JuYoung Kim, Kun Il Kim, Hackjin Kim","doi":"10.1093/cercor/bhaf108","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/cercor/bhaf108","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Leaders often face a dilemma when balancing the prioritization of group performance with gaining social approval from group members, a tension that can have significant consequences for the entire group. Despite its importance, the neural mechanisms underlying this leadership dilemma have not been thoroughly explored. In this study, participants, ostensibly designated as leaders of a group with 2 other members, engaged in a puzzle choice task that presented a conflict between group performance and social approval, all within either a public or a private setting. Leaders showed a preference for choices that prioritized social approval over group performance in public settings more than in private settings. When managing these dilemmas, relationship-oriented leaders engaged the ventral subregions of the medial prefrontal cortex, while goal-oriented leaders engaged the dorsal subregion. These findings contribute to our understanding of how the human brain navigates strategic leadership decisions, particularly in scenarios demanding a delicate balance between popularity and group performance.</p>","PeriodicalId":9715,"journal":{"name":"Cerebral cortex","volume":"35 5","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.9,"publicationDate":"2025-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144155941","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Cerebral cortexPub Date : 2025-05-01DOI: 10.1093/cercor/bhaf107
Edmund T Rolls, Chenfei Zhang, Jianfeng Feng
{"title":"Slow semantic learning in the cerebral cortex, and its relation to the hippocampal episodic memory system.","authors":"Edmund T Rolls, Chenfei Zhang, Jianfeng Feng","doi":"10.1093/cercor/bhaf107","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/cercor/bhaf107","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>A key question is how new semantic representations are formed in the human brain and how this may benefit from the hippocampal episodic memory system. Here, we describe the major effective connectivity between the hippocampal memory system and the anterior temporal lobe (ATL) semantic memory system in humans. Then, we present and model a theory of how semantic representations may be formed in the human ATL using slow associative learning in semantic attractor networks that receive inputs from the hippocampal episodic memory system. The hypothesis is that if one category of semantic representations is being processed for several seconds, then a slow short-term memory trace associative biologically plausible learning rule will enable all the components during that time to be associated together in a semantic attractor network. This benefits from the binding of components provided by the hippocampal episodic memory system. The theory is modeled in a four-layer network for view-invariant visual object recognition, followed by a semantic attractor network layer that utilizes a temporal trace associative learning rule to form semantic categories based on the inputs that occur close together in time, using inputs from the hippocampal system or from the world.</p>","PeriodicalId":9715,"journal":{"name":"Cerebral cortex","volume":"35 5","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.9,"publicationDate":"2025-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143981586","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Cerebral cortexPub Date : 2025-05-01DOI: 10.1093/cercor/bhaf114
Sarah E Henderson, Djamari Oetringer, Linda Geerligs, Karen L Campbell
{"title":"Neural state changes during movie watching relate to episodic memory in younger and older adults.","authors":"Sarah E Henderson, Djamari Oetringer, Linda Geerligs, Karen L Campbell","doi":"10.1093/cercor/bhaf114","DOIUrl":"10.1093/cercor/bhaf114","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Event segmentation is a key feature underlying the ability to remember real-life occurrences. At the neural level, event boundaries have been shown to align with boundaries between neural states-stable patterns of brain activity maintained over time. These neural states provide a valuable window into the neural underpinnings of event perception. To investigate how neural state boundaries relate to memory across the lifespan, we used the data-driven Greedy State Boundary Search method to implicitly identify neural state changes in younger and older adults' electroencephalography data during movie watching. Memory for the movie was tested and related to (1) neural state correspondence across individuals and (2) the degree to which the pattern of activity changes at boundaries. Neural state boundaries significantly aligned across people, but did not differ with age nor relate to memory. The degree of change at neural state boundaries also did not differ with age, but was positively related to memory for the movie. These findings suggest that age differences in the perception of naturalistic events may be less pronounced than previously thought, at least when measured implicitly, and that greater distinction between successive neural states relates to better memory for one's experiences regardless of age.</p>","PeriodicalId":9715,"journal":{"name":"Cerebral cortex","volume":"35 5","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.9,"publicationDate":"2025-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC12086427/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144092880","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}