Poster No:
744
Submission Type:
Abstract Submission
Authors:
Siyu Zhu1, Qi Liu2, Xiaolu Zhang3, Keith Kendrick2, Weihua Zhao2
Institutions:
1Chengdu Sport University, Chengdu, Sichuan, 2University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu, Sichuan, 3Anhui Children’s Hospital, Hefei, Sichuan
First Author:
Siyu Zhu
Chengdu Sport University
Chengdu, Sichuan
Co-Author(s):
Qi Liu
University of Electronic Science and Technology of China
Chengdu, Sichuan
Keith Kendrick
University of Electronic Science and Technology of China
Chengdu, Sichuan
Weihua Zhao
University of Electronic Science and Technology of China
Chengdu, Sichuan
Introduction:
Transcutaneous auricular vagus nerve stimulation (taVNS) as a non-invasive neuromodulation technique has been proposed to enhance inhibitory control via its modulation of the locus coeruleus-norepinephrine (LC–NE) network and GABAergic system (Colzato & Beste, 2020). Some initial human studies provided preliminary evidence that taVNS enhanced inhibitory control, especially response inhibition with an emotional face Go/No-Go task in our previous study (Zhu et al., 2024). However, taVNS's modulatory effects on emotional scenes response inhibition is unknown. The present sham-controlled between-subject study combined with functional near infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) was conduct to investigate the neurocomputational mechanisms of taVNS's effects on emotional response inhibition with an emotional scene Go/No-Go task.
Methods:
Ninety healthy subjects were recruited (eighty-two were included in the final analysis with forty-two females). After completing questionnaires, they were randomly assigned to receive either taVNS or sham stimulation for 30 minutes until the emotional scene Go/No-Go task was completed. Behavioral performance including reaction time in Go trials (RT_Go) and accuracy of No-Go trials (ACC_No-Go) were measured. Computational mechanisms of response inhibition were explored by using Hierarchical Bayesian estimation of the Drift Diffusion Model (HDDM, implemented in Python 3.8 (Wiecki, Sofer & Frank, 2013)). Four parameters including drift rate (v), starting point (z), boundary separation (a), and non-decision time (Ter) were estimated across taVNS and sham-controlled groups respectively. Generalized linear model analyses and dynamic functional connectivity analyses were conducted based on fNIRS data. Mediation models was performed to explore the neurocomputational mechanisms of taVNS effects on emotional response inhibition.
Results:
It has been found that taVNS increased the accuracy of response inhibition on emotional scenes. Notably, response time of correct Go response also increased after taVNS, and this was positively correlated with increased accuracy of response inhibition on emotional scenes. More importantly, drift rate for correct Go response decreased after taVNS compared to sham stimulation. Furthermore, taVNS significantly enhanced the activation of left and right inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) for response inhibition on emotional scenes. Functional coupling between IFG and orbitofrontal cortex was significantly enhanced while functional coupling between IFG and medial prefrontal cortex was reduced after taVNS, and they parallelly mediated the effect of taVNS on increased accuracy of response inhibition on emotional scenes.
Conclusions:
This study provided neurocomputational evidence for taVNS facilitating response inhibition on emotional scenes, demonstrating a promising therapeutic role of taVNS in treating specific disorders characterized by emotional response inhibition deficits.
Brain Stimulation:
Non-Invasive Stimulation Methods Other 2
Higher Cognitive Functions:
Executive Function, Cognitive Control and Decision Making 1
Keywords:
Computational Neuroscience
Other - Transcutaneous auricular vagus nerve stimulation
1|2Indicates the priority used for review
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Please indicate below if your study was a "resting state" or "task-activation” study.
Task-activation
Healthy subjects only or patients (note that patient studies may also involve healthy subjects):
Healthy subjects
Was this research conducted in the United States?
No
Were any human subjects research approved by the relevant Institutional Review Board or ethics panel?
NOTE: Any human subjects studies without IRB approval will be automatically rejected.
Yes
Were any animal research approved by the relevant IACUC or other animal research panel?
NOTE: Any animal studies without IACUC approval will be automatically rejected.
Yes
Please indicate which methods were used in your research:
Computational modeling
Other, Please specify
-
fNIRS
Provide references using APA citation style.
Colzato, L., & Beste, C. (2020). A literature review on the neurophysiological underpinnings and cognitive effects of transcutaneous vagus nerve stimulation: Challenges and future directions. Journal of Neurophysiology, 123(5), 1739–1755.
Wiecki, T., Sofer, I., & Frank, M. (2013). HDDM: Hierarchical bayesian estimation of the drift-diffusion model in Python. Frontiers in Neuroinformatics, 7, 1–10.
Zhu, S., Liu, Q., Zhang, X., Zhou, M., Zhou, X., Ding, F., Zhang, R., Becker, B., Kendrick, K. M., & Zhao, W. (2024). Transcutaneous auricular vagus nerve stimulation enhanced emotional inhibitory control via increasing intrinsic prefrontal couplings. International Journal of Clinical and Health Psychology, 24(2), 100462.
No