Harting Cosima, Hehemann Lena, Stetza Lisa, Kayser Christoph
Biology, Bielefeld University, Bielefeld 33615, Germany.
Proc Biol Sci. 2025 Apr;292(2044):20242566. doi: 10.1098/rspb.2024.2566. Epub 2025 Apr 9.
Sensory-cognitive functions are intertwined with physiological processes such as the heart beat or respiration. For example, we tend to align our respiratory cycle to expected events or actions. This happens during sports but also in computer-based tasks and systematically structures respiratory phase around relevant events. However, studies also show that trial-by-trial variations in respiratory phase shape brain activity and the speed or accuracy of individual responses. We show that both phenomena-the alignment of respiration to expected events and the explanatory power of the respiratory phase on behaviour-co-exist. In fact, both the average respiratory phase of an individual relative to the experimental trials and trial-to-trial variations in respiratory phase hold significant predictive power on behavioural performance, in particular for reaction times. This co-modulation of respiration and behaviour emerges regardless of whether an individual generally breathes faster or slower and is strongest for the respiratory phase about 2 s prior to participant's responses. The persistence of these effects across 12 datasets with 277 participants performing sensory-cognitive tasks confirms the robustness of these results, and suggests a profound and time-lagged influence of structured respiration on sensory-motor responses.
感觉认知功能与诸如心跳或呼吸等生理过程相互交织。例如，我们倾向于使呼吸周期与预期事件或动作同步。这在运动过程中会发生，在基于计算机的任务中也会出现，并且会围绕相关事件系统地构建呼吸阶段。然而，研究还表明，呼吸阶段的逐次试验变化会塑造大脑活动以及个体反应的速度或准确性。我们表明，这两种现象——呼吸与预期事件的同步以及呼吸阶段对行为的解释力——是共存的。事实上，个体相对于实验试验的平均呼吸阶段以及呼吸阶段的逐次试验变化对行为表现都具有显著的预测能力，尤其是对于反应时间。呼吸与行为的这种共同调制现象无论个体总体呼吸是快还是慢都会出现，并且在参与者做出反应前约2秒的呼吸阶段最为强烈。这些效应在12个数据集、277名执行感觉认知任务的参与者中持续存在，证实了这些结果的稳健性，并表明有组织的呼吸对感觉运动反应具有深远且存在时间滞后的影响。
