TY - JOUR A1 - Michałowski, Jarosław M. A1 - Wiwatowska, Ewa A1 - Weymar, Mathias T1 - Brain potentials reveal reduced attention and error-processing during a monetary Go/No-Go task in procrastination JF - Scientific reports N2 - Procrastination is a self-regulatory problem of voluntarily and destructively delaying intended and necessary or personally important tasks. Previous studies showed that procrastination is associated with executive dysfunctions that seem to be particularly strong in punishing contexts. In the present event-related potential (ERP) study a monetary version of the parametric Go/No-Go task was performed by high and low academic procrastinators to verify the influence of motivational context (reward vs. punishment expectation) and task difficulty (easy vs. hard) on procrastination-related executive dysfunctions. The results revealed increased post-error slowing along with reduced P300 and error-related negativity (ERN) amplitudes in high (vs. low) procrastination participants-effects that indicate impaired attention and error-related processing in this group. This pattern of results did not differ as a function of task difficulty and motivation condition. However, when the task got more difficult executive attention deficits became even more apparent at the behavioral level in high procrastinators, as indexed by increased reaction time variability. The findings substantiate prior preliminary evidence that procrastinators show difficulties in certain aspects of executive functioning (in attention and error processing) during execution of task-relevant behavior, which may be more apparent in highly demanding situations. KW - Attention KW - Cognitive control KW - Motivation KW - Neurophysiology KW - Neuroscience KW - Psychology KW - Reward Y1 - 2020 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-020-75311-2 SN - 2045-2322 VL - 10 IS - 1 PB - Macmillan Publishers Limited, part of Springer Nature CY - London ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Schaefer, Laura A1 - Löffler, Nils A1 - Klein, Julia A1 - Bittmann, Frank T1 - Mechanomyography and acceleration show interlimb asymmetries in Parkinson patients without tremor compared to controls during a unilateral motor task JF - Scientific reports N2 - The mechanical muscular oscillations are rarely the objective of investigations regarding the identification of a biomarker for Parkinson's disease (PD). Therefore, the aim of this study was to investigate whether or not this specific motor output differs between PD patients and controls. The novelty is that patients without tremor are investigated performing a unilateral isometric motor task. The force of armflexors and the forearm acceleration (ACC) were recorded as well as the mechanomyography of the biceps brachii (MMGbi), brachioradialis (MMGbra) and pectoralis major (MMGpect) muscles using a piezoelectric-sensor-based system during a unilateral motor task at 70% of the MVIC. The frequency, a power-frequency-ratio, the amplitude variation, the slope of amplitudes and their interlimb asymmetries were analysed. The results indicate that the oscillatory behavior of muscular output in PD without tremor deviates from controls in some parameters: Significant differences appeared for the power-frequency-ratio (p=0.001, r=0.43) and for the amplitude variation (p=0.003, r=0.34) of MMGpect. The interlimb asymmetries differed significantly concerning the power-frequency-ratio of MMGbi (p=0.013, r=0.42) and MMGbra (p=0.048, r=0.39) as well as regarding the mean frequency (p=0.004, r=0.48) and amplitude variation of MMGpect (p=0.033, r=0.37). The mean (M) and variation coefficient (CV) of slope of ACC differed significantly (M: p=0.022, r=0.33; CV: p=0.004, r=0.43). All other parameters showed no significant differences between PD and controls. It remains open, if this altered mechanical muscular output is reproducible and specific for PD. KW - Diseases KW - Neurology KW - Neuroscience Y1 - 2021 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-021-81672-z SN - 2045-2322 VL - 11 IS - 1 PB - Macmillan CY - London ER - TY - JOUR A1 - van Buuren, Jasper T1 - critique of neuroscience JF - Continental philosophy review N2 - Bennett and Hacker criticize a number of neuroscientists and philosophers for attributing capacities which belong to the human being as a whole, like perceiving or deciding, to a “part” of the human being, viz. the brain. They call this type of mistake the “mereological fallacy”. Interestingly, the authors say that these capacities cannot be ascribed to the mind either. They reject not only materialistic monism but also Cartesian dualism, arguing that many predicates describing human life do not refer to physical or mental properties, nor to the sum of such properties. I agree with this important principle and with the critique of the mereological fallacy which it underpins, but I have two objections to the authors’ view. Firstly, I think that the brain is not literally a part of the human being, as suggested. Secondly, Bennett and Hacker do not offer an account of body and mind which explains in a systematic way how the domain of phenomena which transcends the mental and the physical relates to the mental and the physical. I first argue that Helmuth Plessner’s philosophical anthropology provides the kind of account we need. Then, drawing on Plessner, I present an alternative view of the mereological relationships between brain and human being. My criticism does not undercut Bennett and Hacker’s diagnosis of the mereological fallacy but rather gives it a more solid philosophical–anthropological foundation. KW - Mereological fallacy KW - Neuroscience KW - Philosophical anthropology KW - Body as subject and object KW - Eccentric positionality KW - Personhood KW - Psychophysical neutrality Y1 - 2016 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1007/s11007-015-9318-4 SN - 1387-2842 SN - 1573-1103 VL - 49 SP - 223 EP - 241 PB - Springer CY - Dordrecht ER -