Electroencephalographic neurofeedback training can decrease conscious motor control and increase single and dual-task psychomotor performance

Abstract

The control of human movements is thought to automize with repetition, promoting consistent execution and reduced dual-task costs. However, contingencies such as illness or constraints to regular movement patterns can promote conscious motor control, which can reduce movement proficiency and make dual-task situations more difficult. This experiment evaluated whether electroencephalographic neurofeedback training can reduce the adverse effects of conscious motor control. Twenty-five participants completed the timed-up-and-go task while wearing a leg brace to de-automize their regular movement, under both single and dual-task (walking + serial sevens) conditions, both before and after 30-min of neurofeedback training. Three different types of neurofeedback were prescribed across three laboratory visits. We hypothesised that training to decrease central EEG alpha-power at scalp sites above the supplementary motor area would facilitate performance compared to opposite (increase central EEG alpha-power) or sham neurofeedback training. Results revealed a pre-test to post-test improvement in performance on the single-task and on both aspects of the dual-task when participants were trained to decrease central EEG alpha-power. There were no benefits of opposite or sham neurofeedback training. Mediation analyses revealed that the improvement in dual-task motor performance was mediated by the improvement in cognitive performance. This suggests that the neurofeedback protocol was beneficial because it helped to reduce conscious control of the motor task. The findings could have important implications for rehabilitation and high-performance (e.g., elite sport) domains; neurofeedback could be prescribed to help alleviate the problems that can arise when individuals exert conscious motor control.

A Method for Using Neurofeedback to Guide Mental Imagery for Improving Motor Skill

“…Specific to motor function, prior work showed change in motor skill by influencing regional brain activities [28], [29], 2 [30], [31], [32], [33]. In these studies, the focus was to regulate the sensorimotor rhythms (SMR) through MI, based on the hypothesis that modulating a specific band power over motor areas would influence the related motor behavior.…”

Managing Intractable Symptoms of Parkinson's Disease: A Nonsurgical Approach Employing Infralow Frequency Neuromodulation

“…The literature regarding NF and PD does not include the utilization of the ILF method in particular. The promotion of automatic motor control by NF is believed to help patients (Sidhu and Cooke, 2021 ). Most reviews of PD in the NF literature utilize classical somatomotor rhythm (SMR)-based methods for NF that involve threshold-based training using a consciously mediated feedback (usually visual) reward.…”

“…Cortical beta suppression with SMR training has been advocated on the observation that cortical beta oscillations are suppressed by levodopa (Doyle et al, 2005 ). Proposed mechanisms with SMR training include inducing plastic changes in the subthalamic nucleus (Fukuma et al, 2018 ), recruitment of unaffected nearby compensatory pathways (Philippens et al, 2017 ), and encouraging a shift toward more automatic motor control (Sidhu and Cooke, 2021 ).…”

“…Relatedly, stimulation of the posterior hypothalamus has been shown to restore locomotion in rats with haloperidol-induced akinesia (Young et al, 2011 ), probably by inducing frontal cortex slow delta (and concomitant beta-suppression) (Sano et al, 1970 ). Other NF investigators have recently proposed that training to decrease central alpha power at scalp sites over the supplementary motor area (SMA) results in activation of SMA to replicate activity patterns reflecting “autonomous locomotion,” and that this shift toward increased motor automaticity (requiring less conscious motor control) benefits whole body performance (Sidhu and Cooke, 2021 ).…”

The Frequency of Use of Eeg and Neurofeedback in Sport, Systematic Review

“…The effectiveness of the method is measured by the speed and accuracy of the implementation of the planned action (SALEH et al, 2006). It has a beneficial effect on any movement affecting motor performance that requires automatic movements and steep learning curves (SIDHU-COOKE, 2021).…”