Department of Psychology, University of Marburg, Marburg, Germany.
Department of Psychology, Stanford University, Stanford, California, USA.
Psychophysiology. 2024 Jul;61(7):e14563. doi: 10.1111/psyp.14563. Epub 2024 Mar 11.
In the face of unpredictable threat, rapid processing of external events and behavioral mobilization through early psychophysiological responses are crucial for survival. While unpredictable threat generally enhances early processing, it would seem adaptive to particularly increase sensitivity for unexpected events as they may signal danger. To examine this possibility, n = 77 participants performed an auditory oddball paradigm and received unpredictable shocks in threat but not in safe contexts while a stream of frequent (standard) and infrequent (deviant) tones was presented. We assessed event-related potentials (ERP), heart period (HP), and time-lagged within-subject correlations of single-trial EEG and HP (cardio-EEG covariance tracing, CECT) time-locked to the tones. N1 and P2 ERP amplitudes were generally enhanced under threat. The P3 amplitude was enhanced to deviants versus standards and this effect was reduced in the threat condition. Regarding HP, both threat versus safe and unexpected versus expected tones led to stronger cardiac acceleration, suggesting separate effects of threat and stimulus expectancy on HP. Finally, CECTs revealed two correlation clusters, indicating that single-trial EEG magnitudes in the N1/P2 and P3 time-windows predicted subsequent cardiac acceleration. The current results show that an unpredictable threat context enhances N1 and P2 amplitudes and cardiac acceleration to benign auditory stimuli. They further suggest separable cortical correlates of different effects on cardiac activity: an early N1/P2 correlate associated with threat-effects on HP and a later P3 correlate associated with expectedness-effects. Finally, the results indicate that unpredictable threat attenuates rather than enhances the processing of unexpected benign events during the P3 latency.
面对不可预测的威胁，通过早期心理生理反应快速处理外部事件和行为动员对于生存至关重要。虽然不可预测的威胁通常会增强早期处理，但似乎更适应于特别增加对意外事件的敏感性，因为它们可能预示着危险。为了检验这种可能性，n=77 名参与者在威胁而非安全环境中进行了听觉Oddball 范式，并接受了不可预测的电击，同时呈现了一系列频繁（标准）和不频繁（偏差）的音调。我们评估了事件相关电位（ERP）、心率（HP）以及与音调时间锁定的单试 EEG 和 HP（心脑电图协方差追踪，CECT）的时间滞后内的个体内相关性。在威胁下，N1 和 P2 ERP 幅度通常增强。与标准相比，P3 幅度对偏差增强，而在威胁条件下，这种效应降低。关于 HP，无论是威胁与安全还是意外与预期的音调都导致更强的心脏加速，表明威胁和刺激预期对 HP 有单独的影响。最后，CECTs 揭示了两个相关簇，表明 N1/P2 和 P3 时间窗口中单试 EEG 幅度预测随后的心脏加速。目前的结果表明，不可预测的威胁环境增强了对良性听觉刺激的 N1 和 P2 幅度和心脏加速。它们进一步表明，对心脏活动的不同影响具有可分离的皮质相关性：与威胁对 HP 的影响相关的早期 N1/P2 相关性，以及与预期对 P3 相关性相关的后期 P3 相关性。最后，结果表明，不可预测的威胁会减弱而不是增强 P3 潜伏期内意外良性事件的处理。
