Oscillatory Brain Activity in the Alpha Range is Modulated by the Content of Word-prompted Mental Imagery

Overview

Journal Psychophysiology

Specialty Psychiatry

Date 2015 Jan 24

PMID 25616004

Citations 19

Authors

Felix Bartsch

Gilava Hamuni

Vladimir Miskovic

Peter J Lang

Andreas Keil

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Mental imagery is a fundamental cognitive process of interest to basic scientists and clinical researchers. This study examined large-scale oscillatory brain activity in the alpha band (8-12 Hz) during language-driven mental imagery using dense-array EEG. Three experiments demonstrated relative increases in alpha amplitude: (1) during imagery prompted by words compared to fixation without imagery instruction, (2) during imagery of word content compared to imagery of geometric shapes, and (3) during imagery of emotionally evocative words compared to imagery of less emotionally arousing content. Alpha increases for semantically loaded imagery were observed in parieto-occipital regions, sustained throughout the imagery period. Findings imply that alpha oscillations index active memory and internal cognitive processing, reflecting neural communication in cortical networks representing motor, semantic, and perceptual aspects of the imagined scene.

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