Bitsios Panos, Giakoumaki Stella G
Department of Psychiatry and Behavioural Sciences, Faculty of Medicine, University of Crete, Heraklion, Crete, Greece.
Int J Psychophysiol. 2005 Feb;55(2):229-41. doi: 10.1016/j.ijpsycho.2004.08.002.
Prepulse inhibition (PPI) of the startle reflex at short lead intervals is thought to reflect the operation of a preattentive "sensorimotor gating" mechanism, which suggests that processing of the prepulse stimulus should not be modulated prior to its inhibitory effects on startle. To test this hypothesis, we examined whether PPI is affected following habituation to the prepulse. PPI was measured in two sessions associated with either the presence (habituation condition) or the absence (control condition) of prepulse repetition. There was a trend for prepulse repetition to reduce the effectiveness of that prepulse in inhibiting the startle response. We also explored the relationship of PPI to scores in tests of selective and sustained attention and planning ability. Overall PPI performance was correlated to performance indices of planning ability and there was a trend level correlation with scores in selective but not sustained attention tests. These preliminary results merit further investigation.
短超前间隔下惊跳反射的前脉冲抑制（PPI）被认为反映了一种前注意“感觉运动门控”机制的运作，这表明在前脉冲对惊跳的抑制作用之前，前脉冲刺激的处理不应受到调制。为了验证这一假设，我们研究了对前脉冲产生习惯化后PPI是否会受到影响。在与前脉冲重复出现（习惯化条件）或不存在（对照条件）相关的两个实验环节中测量PPI。前脉冲重复存在降低该前脉冲抑制惊跳反应有效性的趋势。我们还探讨了PPI与选择性和持续性注意力测试及计划能力测试分数之间的关系。总体而言，PPI表现与计划能力的表现指标相关，并且在选择性注意力测试分数上存在趋势水平的相关性，但在持续性注意力测试中不存在相关性。这些初步结果值得进一步研究。
