Department of Psychology, Manisa Celal Bayar University, Turkey; Department of Psychology, University of Sheffield, UK.
Center for Cognition and Sociality, Institute of Basic Science, South Korea.
Neuropsychologia. 2021 Jul 30;158:107908. doi: 10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2021.107908. Epub 2021 May 29.
Sense of agency (SoA), the experience of being in control of our voluntary actions and their outcomes, is a key feature of normal human experience. Frontoparietal brain circuits associated with SoA undergo a major maturational process during adolescence. To examine whether this translates to neurodevelopmental changes in agency experience, we investigated two key neural processes associated with SoA, the activity that is leading to voluntary action (Readiness Potential) and the activity that is associated with the action outcome processing (attenuation of auditory N1 and P2 event related potentials, ERPs) in mid-adolescents (13-14), late-adolescents (18-20) and adults (25-28) while they perform an intentional binding task. In this task, participants pressed a button (action) that delivered a tone (outcome) after a small delay and reported the time of the tone using the Libet clock. This action-outcome condition alternated with a no-action condition where an identical tone was triggered by a computer. Mid-adolescents showed greater outcome binding, such that they perceived self-triggered tones as being temporally closer to their actions compared to adults. Suggesting greater agency experience over the outcomes of their voluntary actions during mid-adolescence. Consistent with this, greater levels of attenuated neural response to self-triggered auditory tones (specifically P2 attenuation) were found during mid-adolescence compared to older age groups. This enhanced attenuation decreased with age as observed in outcome binding. However, there were no age-related differences in the readiness potential leading to the voluntary action (button press) as well as in the N1 attenuation to the self-triggered tones. Notably, in mid-adolescents greater outcome binding scores were positively associated with greater P2 attenuation, and smaller negativity in the late readiness potential. These findings suggest that the greater experience of implicit agency observed during mid-adolescence may be mediated by a neural over-suppression of action outcomes (auditory P2 attenuation), and over-reliance on motor preparation (late readiness potential), which we found to become adult-like during late-adolescence. Implications for adolescent development and SoA related neurodevelopmental disorders are discussed.
主体感（SoA）是指我们对自己的自愿行为及其结果的控制感，是正常人类体验的一个关键特征。与 SoA 相关的额顶叶大脑回路在青春期经历了一个主要的成熟过程。为了研究这是否转化为主体感体验的神经发育变化，我们调查了与 SoA 相关的两个关键神经过程，即导致自愿行为的活动（预备电位）和与行为结果处理相关的活动（听觉 N1 和 P2 事件相关电位的衰减，ERPs），在青少年中期（13-14 岁）、青少年后期（18-20 岁）和成年期（25-28 岁）进行意向绑定任务时。在这个任务中，参与者按下一个按钮（动作），在一个小延迟后发出一个音调（结果），并使用利贝特时钟报告音调的时间。这种动作-结果条件与无动作条件交替出现，在无动作条件下，计算机触发相同的音调。青少年中期表现出更大的结果绑定，使得他们感知到自我触发的音调与他们的动作相比时间上更接近。这表明在青少年中期，他们对自己自愿行为的结果有更大的主体感。与这一发现一致的是，与年龄较大的群体相比，在青少年中期观察到对自我触发的听觉音调的神经反应（特别是 P2 衰减）更大。这种增强的衰减随着年龄的增长而减少，如在结果绑定中观察到的那样。然而，在导致自愿行为（按钮按下）的预备电位以及对自我触发音调的 N1 衰减方面，没有年龄相关的差异。值得注意的是，在青少年中期，更大的结果绑定分数与更大的 P2 衰减以及晚期预备电位中的较小负性呈正相关。这些发现表明，在青少年中期观察到的更大的隐性主体感可能是由对行动结果（听觉 P2 衰减）的过度抑制以及对运动准备（晚期预备电位）的过度依赖介导的，我们发现这种依赖在青少年后期变得像成年人一样。讨论了这些发现对青少年发展和与 SoA 相关的神经发育障碍的意义。
