Alteration of Behavioral Inhibitory Control in High-Altitude Immigrants

Abstract

Behavioral inhibitory control (BIC) acts as a key cognitive ability, which is essential for humans to withhold inappropriate behaviors. Meanwhile, many studies reported that long-term exposure to high altitude (HA) may affect cognitive ability. However, it is not clear whether long-term exposure to HAs may affect the BIC of an individual. To clarify the role of altitude in the behavioral control of adults and the underlying neural mechanism, we explored the BIC neural activity profiles of healthy immigrants from low-altitude (LA) regions to HA regions. Combining a two-choice oddball paradigm and electrophysiological techniques, this study monitored the N2 and P3 event-related components and neural oscillations across LA and HA groups. Results showed longer reaction times (RTs) for the HA group than the LA group. Relative to the LA group, lower N2 and P3 amplitudes were observed for the HA group. Significant positive correlations were also found between P3 amplitude and theta/delta band power across both groups. Importantly, lower theta/delta band powers were only observed for the HA group under the deviant condition. Collectively, these findings suggest that long-term exposure to HAs may attenuate BIC during the response inhibition stage and provide valuable insights into the neurocognitive implications of environmental altitude on BIC.

Evoked Acute Stress Alters Frontal Midline Neural Oscillations Affecting Behavioral Inhibition in College Students

“… 36 Wang et al Used a two-choice Oddball task to study the behavioral inhibition of individuals at different altitudes, they found that theta power of deviant stimuli was significantly higher than that of standard stimuli, with individuals at higher altitudes requiring longer response times and electrophysiologically exhibiting lower P3 amplitude and theta power. 37 The results of the present study are consistent with this, with deviant stimuli triggering higher power theta bands in the frontal midline compared to standard stimuli. The findings indicate that the theta band power was increased under stress in response to the standard stimulus, while there was no statistically significant difference between the two states in response to the deviant stimulus.…”

The neuroimmune pathway of high-altitude adaptation: influence of erythrocytes on attention networks through inflammation and the autonomic nervous system

“…Our results suggest that HRV (LF/HF ratio) can predict performance of executive control behavior, as well as brain activity during alerting and orienting. It is worth noting that the theta power represents the cognitive resources related to attention (Thayer and Lane, 2000 ; Thayer et al, 2009 ; Park and Thayer, 2014 ), alpha ITC represents the selective inhibition of target information in sensory input (inhibition of irrelevant information and discrete cognitive processes) (Hanslmayr et al, 2005 ; Busch et al, 2009 ; Gutteling et al, 2022 ), P3 may be a neurophysiological marker sensitive to high-altitude exposure (Wesensten et al, 1993 ; Singh et al, 2004 ; Wang et al, 2021 ). P3 amplitude reflects the allocation of attentional resources (Polich, 2007 ; Fogarty et al, 2018 ), and a decrease in amplitude indicates a reduction in the remaining effective indicator of mental resources (Magliero et al, 1984 ; Clayson and Larson, 2011 ; Schmidt-Kassow et al, 2013 ; Fogarty et al, 2018 ).…”

The human brain in a high altitude natural environment: A review

“…Recently, serial task-induced ERPs were measured in immigrants who had lived at Lhasa (3560 m) for more than 2 years. The HA immigrants showed reduced attentional resources with smaller P3 amplitudes ( Wang et al, 2014 ; Qiu et al, 2021 ), reduced attention reactions in visual search tasks with lower N2pc amplitudes ( Zhang et al, 2018a ), overactive performance monitoring with larger error-related negative and correct-related negative amplitudes ( Ma et al, 2015a ), impaired response inhibition in the conflict-monitoring stage ( Ma et al, 2015b ; Wang et al, 2021 ) and visual executive ability ( Ma et al, 2015c ) with smaller P3 amplitudes, slowed stimulus-driven behaviors and P3 magnitudes of resource allocation ( Ma et al, 2018a ), impaired spatial manipulation ability with larger rotation-related negativity amplitudes ( Ma et al, 2018b ), decreased P50 mean amplitude and delay activity amplitude of mental rotation ( Li et al, 2021 ), impaired spatial working memory with lower P2 and impaired verbal and spatial working memory maintenance with late-positive potentials ( Ma et al, 2019b ), and decreased alpha event-related desynchronization at the parietal-occipital regions and beta event-related desynchronization at the central-parietal regions within the time window (400–700 ms) in the mental rotation task ( Xiang et al, 2021 ). Taken together, these electrophysiological studies showed that prolonged exposure to HA mainly impairs the late processing stage of cognition due to insufficient attention resources.…”