Institute of Psychology and Cognition Research, University of Bremen, Grazer Str. 4, D-28359 Bremen, Germany.
Neurosci Lett. 2011 May 16;495(2):159-63. doi: 10.1016/j.neulet.2011.03.062. Epub 2011 Mar 29.
Behavioral and electrophysiological data related to performance in an auditory Go/NoGo task were analyzed in young and older adults in the present study. Especially, differences in within-person variability in behavior and neural activity between young and older adults and changes in topography of slow event-related oscillations (EROs) were of interest. Within-person variability in behavior was assessed by reaction time (RT) variability. Event-related delta and theta oscillations were analyzed using time-frequency transformation, which can give information on the time-course of single trial event-related EEG spectral power enhancement and intertrial phase-locking (ITC). In contrast to our previous visual Go/NoGo study, no under-recruitment of task-relevant brain regions was found for the auditory theta and delta EROs. Young did not differ from older adults in RT variability or in single trial delta/theta ITC. Altered recruitment of brain activity at advanced age was indicated, first, by stronger early theta phase-locking in older compared to young adults and, second, by a Go-specific lateralization of delta/theta activity. We conclude that within-person variability may increase with age, but the degree depends on performance level and the modality investigated.
本研究分析了年轻和老年成年人在听觉 Go/NoGo 任务中的行为和电生理数据。特别关注的是，年轻和老年成年人之间行为和神经活动的个体内可变性差异，以及慢事件相关振荡 (EROs) 的拓扑结构变化。行为的个体内可变性通过反应时间 (RT) 可变性来评估。使用时频转换分析事件相关的 delta 和 theta 振荡，该方法可以提供有关单次试验事件相关 EEG 频谱功率增强和试验间相位锁定 (ITC) 的时间进程的信息。与我们之前的视觉 Go/NoGo 研究不同，听觉 theta 和 delta ERO 并没有发现任务相关脑区的过度招募。年轻组和老年组在 RT 可变性或单次试验 delta/theta ITC 方面没有差异。表明大脑活动的招募发生了改变，首先，与年轻人相比，老年人的早期 theta 相位锁定更强，其次，delta/theta 活动具有特定的 Go 侧化。我们得出结论，个体内可变性可能会随着年龄的增长而增加，但程度取决于表现水平和所研究的模态。
