On the Globality of Motor Suppression: Unexpected Events and Their Influence on Behavior and Cognition

Overview

Journal Neuron

Publisher Cell Press

Specialty Neurology

Date 2017 Jan 20

PMID 28103476

Citations 177

Authors

Jan R Wessel

Adam R Aron

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Unexpected events are part of everyday experience. They come in several varieties-action errors, unexpected action outcomes, and unexpected perceptual events-and they lead to motor slowing and cognitive distraction. While different varieties of unexpected events have been studied largely independently, and many different mechanisms are thought to explain their effects on action and cognition, we suggest a unifying theory. We propose that unexpected events recruit a fronto-basal-ganglia network for stopping. This network includes specific prefrontal cortical nodes and is posited to project to the subthalamic nucleus, with a putative global suppressive effect on basal-ganglia output. We argue that unexpected events interrupt action and impact cognition, partly at least, by recruiting this global suppressive network. This provides a common mechanistic basis for different types of unexpected events; links the literatures on motor inhibition, performance monitoring, attention, and working memory; and is relevant for understanding clinical symptoms of distractibility and mental inflexibility.

Citing Articles

Parietal cortex is recruited by frontal and cingulate areas to support action monitoring and updating during stopping.

Kang J, Mattar L, Vergara J, Gobo V, Rey H, Heilbronner S bioRxiv. 2025; .

PMID: 40060422 PMC: 11888462. DOI: 10.1101/2025.02.28.640787.

Inhibitory control of speech production in the human premotor frontal cortex.

Zhao L, Silva A, Kurteff G, Chang E Nat Hum Behav. 2025; .

PMID: 40033133 DOI: 10.1038/s41562-025-02118-4.

Computational mechanism underlying switching of motor actions.

Zhong S, Pouratian N, Christopoulos V PLoS Comput Biol. 2025; 21(2):e1012811.

PMID: 39928670 PMC: 11875378. DOI: 10.1371/journal.pcbi.1012811.

Does the stop-signal P3 reflect inhibitory control?.

Hervault M, Soh C, Wessel J Cortex. 2025; 183:232-250.

PMID: 39754857 PMC: 11839379. DOI: 10.1016/j.cortex.2024.12.005.

Unexpected sounds induce a rapid inhibition of eye-movement responses.

Vasilev M, Ozkan Z, Kirkby J, Nuthmann A, Parmentier F Psychophysiology. 2024; 62(1):e14728.

PMID: 39690142 PMC: 11652409. DOI: 10.1111/psyp.14728.

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