Research School of Psychology, Australian National University, Canberra, ACT, 2612, Australia.
School of Psychology, The University of Newcastle, Newcastle, Australia.
Brain Topogr. 2020 May;33(3):317-326. doi: 10.1007/s10548-020-00762-9. Epub 2020 Mar 7.
Contemporary neurocognitive models implicate alpha oscillations as a top-down mechanism of cortical inhibition, instrumental in the suppression of information that fails to reach conscious visual awareness. This suggests that alpha-band activity may play a key role in the phenomenon of inattentional blindness, however this has not yet been empirically examined. The current study employed transcranial alternating current stimulation (tACS) over occipital cortex at alpha, theta, and sham frequencies within an inattentional blindness task to delineate whether an exogenous manipulation of alpha oscillations has a modulatory effect on visual awareness of the unexpected stimulus. Results revealed that compared to theta and sham, those exposed to alpha tACS were more likely to be inattentionally blind to the unexpected stimulus. Findings extend current theoretical views of alpha by suggesting inattentional blindness may be explained as a suppression of irrelevant information via alpha-band.
当代神经认知模型表明，α 振荡是皮层抑制的一种自上而下的机制，对于抑制未能达到意识视觉的信息至关重要。这表明 α 波段活动可能在注意力盲视现象中发挥关键作用，但这尚未得到经验性检验。本研究在注意力盲视任务中，采用经颅交流电刺激（tACS）对枕叶皮层进行 α、θ 和假刺激频率刺激，以明确对 α 振荡的外源性操作是否对意外刺激的视觉意识具有调节作用。结果表明，与θ 和假刺激相比，接受 α tACS 的被试更有可能对意外刺激出现注意力盲视。这些发现通过表明注意力盲视可能是通过 α 波段对无关信息的抑制来解释的，从而扩展了当前关于 α 的理论观点。
