TY - JOUR

T1 - Cognitive and emotional modulation of brain default operation

AU - Pallesen, Karen Johanne

AU - Brattico, Elvira

AU - Bailey, Christopher J

AU - Korvenoja, Antti

AU - Gjedde, Albert

N1 - Keywords: Acoustic Stimulation; Adult; Analysis of Variance; Auditory Perception; Brain; Brain Mapping; Cognition; Emotions; Female; Functional Laterality; Humans; Image Processing, Computer-Assisted; Magnetic Resonance Imaging; Male; Memory, Short-Term; Music; Neural Pathways; Neuropsychological Tests; Oxygen; Questionnaires; Reaction Time; Young Adult

PY - 2009

Y1 - 2009

N2 - Goal-directed behavior lowers activity in brain areas that include the medial frontal cortex, the medial and lateral parietal cortex, and limbic and paralimbic brain regions, commonly referred to as the "default network." These activity decreases are believed to reflect the interruption of processes that are ongoing when the mind is in a restful state. Previously, the nature of these processes was probed by varying cognitive task parameters, but the presence of emotional processes, while often assumed, was little investigated. With fMRI, we studied the effect of systematic variations of both cognitive load and emotional stimulus connotation on task-related decreases in the default network by employing an auditory working memory (WM) task with musical sounds. The performance of the WM task, compared to passive listening, lowered the activity in medial and lateral, prefrontal, parietal, temporal, and limbic regions. In a subset of these regions, the magnitude of decrease depended on the memory load; the greater the cognitive load, the larger the magnitude of the observed decrease. Furthermore, in the right amygdala and the left precuneus, areas previously associated with processing of unpleasant dissonant musical sounds, there was an interaction between the experimental condition and the stimulus type. The current results are consistent with the previously reported effect of task difficulty on task-related brain activation decreases. The results also indicate that task-related decreases may be further modulated by the emotional stimulus connotation.

AB - Goal-directed behavior lowers activity in brain areas that include the medial frontal cortex, the medial and lateral parietal cortex, and limbic and paralimbic brain regions, commonly referred to as the "default network." These activity decreases are believed to reflect the interruption of processes that are ongoing when the mind is in a restful state. Previously, the nature of these processes was probed by varying cognitive task parameters, but the presence of emotional processes, while often assumed, was little investigated. With fMRI, we studied the effect of systematic variations of both cognitive load and emotional stimulus connotation on task-related decreases in the default network by employing an auditory working memory (WM) task with musical sounds. The performance of the WM task, compared to passive listening, lowered the activity in medial and lateral, prefrontal, parietal, temporal, and limbic regions. In a subset of these regions, the magnitude of decrease depended on the memory load; the greater the cognitive load, the larger the magnitude of the observed decrease. Furthermore, in the right amygdala and the left precuneus, areas previously associated with processing of unpleasant dissonant musical sounds, there was an interaction between the experimental condition and the stimulus type. The current results are consistent with the previously reported effect of task difficulty on task-related brain activation decreases. The results also indicate that task-related decreases may be further modulated by the emotional stimulus connotation.

U2 - 10.1162/jocn.2009.21086

DO - 10.1162/jocn.2009.21086

M3 - Journal article

C2 - 18752396

VL - 21

SP - 1065

EP - 1080

JO - Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience

JF - Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience

SN - 0898-929X

IS - 6

ER -