Institute of Psychology, Friedrich Schiller University of Jena, Jena, Germany.
Department of Geriatric Medicine, Jena University Hospital, Jena, Germany.
Psychophysiology. 2019 Dec;56(12):e13458. doi: 10.1111/psyp.13458. Epub 2019 Aug 14.
A recent study claims that participants wearing a bike helmet behave riskier in a computer-based risk task compared to control participants without a bike helmet. We hypothesized that wearing a bike helmet reduces cognitive control over risky behavior. To test our hypothesis, we recorded participants' EEG brain responses while they played a risk game developed in our laboratory. Previously, we found that, in this risk game, anxious participants showed greater levels of cognitive control as revealed by greater frontal midline theta power, which was associated with less risky decisions. Here, we predicted that cognitive control would be reduced in the helmet group, indicated by reduced frontal midline theta power, and that this group would prefer riskier options in the risk game. In line with our hypothesis, we found that participants in the helmet group showed significantly lower frontal midline theta power than participants in the control group, indicating less cognitive control. We did not replicate the finding of generally riskier behavior in the helmet group. Instead, we found that participants chose the riskier option in about half of trials, no matter how risky the other option was. Our results suggest that wearing a bike helmet reduces cognitive control, as revealed by reduced frontal midline theta power, leading to risk indifference when evaluating potential behaviors.
最近的一项研究声称，与未戴自行车头盔的对照组参与者相比，佩戴自行车头盔的参与者在基于计算机的风险任务中表现出更大的风险行为。我们假设戴头盔会降低对风险行为的认知控制。为了检验我们的假设，我们记录了参与者在玩我们实验室开发的风险游戏时的 EEG 脑反应。之前，我们发现，在这个风险游戏中，焦虑的参与者表现出更高水平的认知控制，这表现为额中线 theta 功率更高，与更冒险的决策有关。在这里，我们预测头盔组的认知控制会降低，表现为额中线 theta 功率降低，并且该组在风险游戏中会偏好风险更大的选项。与我们的假设一致，我们发现头盔组的参与者的额中线 theta 功率明显低于对照组的参与者，表明认知控制较低。我们没有复制头盔组行为普遍更冒险的发现。相反，我们发现无论另一个选项多么冒险，参与者在大约一半的试验中都选择了风险更大的选项。我们的结果表明，戴自行车头盔会降低认知控制，表现为额中线 theta 功率降低，导致在评估潜在行为时风险漠不关心。
