Yung Trevor W K, Lai Cynthia Y Y, Chan Chetwyn C H
Department of Rehabilitation Sciences, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Kowloon, Hong Kong SAR, China.
Department of Psychology, The Education University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR, China.
Front Neurosci. 2022 Aug 23;16:875064. doi: 10.3389/fnins.2022.875064. eCollection 2022.
Previous studies have found that sluggish cognitive tempo (SCT) is often associated with difficulties in real-life functioning, such as social problems, emotional difficulties, and academic learning difficulties. However, the underlying mechanisms contributing to the SCT symptoms and its associated real-life difficulties have still not been clearly understood. A previous study has found that SCT symptoms were associated with hypoarousal and hyperarousal toward the sensory stimulus. However, it is still unclear whether such abnormal arousal regulation is related to sustained attention difficulties that have been found to be related to social difficulties and withdrawn behavior in children with SCT. In this study, arousal regulation deficit in SCT is examined by the physiological responses quantified by HRV and EEG in the sensory challenge paradigm. This study aimed to establish a linkage between arousal regulation reflected by HRV and EEG and attention difficulties in children with SCT. The results of this study showed that higher theta power in the auditory stimulation condition than in the resting condition was associated with higher omission errors in sustained attention tasks in the SCT group. It was also found that higher parasympathetic activities during sensory stimulation conditions were associated with higher commission errors in the SCT group. These results reflected that hypersensitivity toward stressful sensitivity toward a stressful sensory stimulus is associated with attention difficulties in children with SCT. This further supported the notion that SCT should be conceptualized as a condition characterized by multiple deficits in different biological systems, such as the cognitive system, the negative valence system, and the arousal regulatory system.
以往的研究发现，迟缓认知节奏（SCT）通常与现实生活中的功能障碍有关，如社交问题、情绪困扰和学业学习困难。然而，导致SCT症状及其相关现实生活困难的潜在机制仍未得到明确理解。此前一项研究发现，SCT症状与对感觉刺激的唤醒不足和唤醒过度有关。然而，目前尚不清楚这种异常的唤醒调节是否与持续注意力困难有关，而持续注意力困难已被发现与SCT儿童的社交困难和退缩行为有关。在本研究中，通过感觉挑战范式中由心率变异性（HRV）和脑电图（EEG）量化的生理反应来检查SCT中的唤醒调节缺陷。本研究旨在建立HRV和EEG所反映的唤醒调节与SCT儿童注意力困难之间的联系。本研究结果表明，在听觉刺激条件下比在静息条件下更高的θ波功率与SCT组持续注意力任务中更高的遗漏错误相关。还发现，在感觉刺激条件下更高的副交感神经活动与SCT组更高的错误接受相关。这些结果反映出，对压力性感觉刺激的过度敏感与SCT儿童的注意力困难有关。这进一步支持了这样一种观点，即SCT应被概念化为一种以不同生物系统（如认知系统、负性价系统和唤醒调节系统）中的多种缺陷为特征的病症。
