Biology subjects

Omigie, D.

Publications and source records attributed to Omigie, D..

4 recordsLinked to original sources

bioRxiv2025

SPONTANEOUS VISUAL IMAGERY DURING EXTENDED MUSIC LISTENING IS ASSOCIATED WITH RELIABLE ALPHA SUPPRESSION

Music is widely recognised as being able to evoke images in the minds eye. However, the neural basis of visual imagery experiences during music listening remains poorly understood. Here, we combined probe-caught experience sampling methodology with 32-channel electroencephalography (EEG) recordings in order to investigate the neuro-oscillatory correlates of music-evoked visual imagery and examine how spontaneously generated imagery compares to more deliberately generated forms. Thirty participants listened with closed eyes to four blocks of music, differing in their familiarity and relaxation potential and spanning a range of genres. In response to probes sent throughout listening, participants indicated whether or not they had been experiencing visual imagery and, if they had, whether the experienced visual imagery had been spontaneous or deliberate. Cluster permutation analyses on the time-frequency decomposed EEG data revealed alpha power suppression during visual imagery that was more reliable during spontaneous than deliberate imagery. Further, while theta and delta bands did not discriminate the presence or absence of the visual imagery experience or its intentionality subtypes, we observed that gamma power suppression in fronto-central areas was present during visual imagery experiences. Our results extend prior findings of a role of posterior alpha suppression in visual imagery to show its reliability in music-evoked spontaneous imagery specifically. We consider plausible interpretations of the presence and absence of other oscillatory signatures in relation to the listening conditions used in the current study. HighlightsO_LIProbe-caught method shown to be effective in capturing moments of music-evoked visual imagery C_LIO_LIEvidence for a high prevalence of spontaneous music-evoked imagery C_LIO_LISpontaneous music-evoked visual imagery shown to be associated with posterior alpha suppression C_LI

neuroscience↗

bioRxiv2021

Prediction Under Uncertainty: Dissociating Sensory from Cognitive Expectations in Highly Uncertain Musical Contexts

Predictive models in the brain rely on the continuous extraction of regularities from the environment. These models are thought to be updated by novel information, as reflected in prediction error responses such as the mismatch negativity (MMN). However, although in real life individuals often face situations in which uncertainty prevails, it remains unclear whether and how predictive models emerge in high-uncertainty contexts. Recent research suggests that uncertainty affects the magnitude of MMN responses in the context of music listening. However, musical predictions are typically studied with MMN stimulation paradigms based on Western tonal music, which are characterized by relatively high predictability. Hence, we developed an MMN paradigm to investigate how the high uncertainty of atonal music modulates predictive processes as indexed by the MMN and behavior. Using MEG in a group of 20 subjects without musical training, we demonstrate that the magnetic MMN in response to pitch, intensity, timbre, and location deviants is evoked in both tonal and atonal melodies, with no significant differences between conditions. In contrast, in a separate behavioral experiment involving 39 non-musicians, participants detected pitch deviants more accurately and rated confidence higher in the tonal than in the atonal musical context. These results indicate that contextual tonal uncertainty modulates processing stages in which conscious awareness is involved, although deviants robustly elicit low-level pre-attentive responses such as the MMN. The achievement of robust MMN responses, despite high tonal uncertainty, is relevant for future studies comparing groups of listeners MMN responses to increasingly ecological music stimuli.

neuroscience↗

bioRxiv2020

Locus of emotion influences psychophysiological reactions to music

It is now widely accepted that the perception of emotional expression in music can be vastly different from the feelings evoked by it. However, less understood is how the locus of emotion affects the experience of music, that is how the act of perceiving the emotion in music compares with the act of assessing the emotion induced in the listener by the music. In the current study, we compared these two emotion loci based on the psychophysiological response of 40 participants listening to 32 musical excerpts taken from movie soundtracks. Facial electromyography, skin conductance, respiration and heart rate were continuously measured while participants were required to assess either the emotion expressed by, or the emotion they felt in response to the music. Using linear mixed effects models, we found a higher mean response in psychophysiological measures for the "perceived" than the "felt" task. This result suggested that the focus on ones self distracts from the music, leading to weaker bodily reactions during the "felt" task. In contrast, paying attention to the expression of the music and consequently to changes in timbre, loudness and harmonic progression enhances bodily reactions. This study has methodological implications for emotion induction research using psychophysiology and the conceptualization of emotion loci. Firstly, different tasks can elicit different psychophysiological responses to the same stimulus and secondly, both tasks elicit bodily responses to music. The latter finding questions the possibility of a listener taking on a purely cognitive mode when evaluating emotion expression.

neuroscience↗

bioRxiv2019

Pupil responses to pitch deviants reflect predictability of melodic sequences.

Humans automatically detect events that, in deviating from their expectations, may signal prediction failure and a need to reorient behaviour. The pupil dilation response (PDR) to violations has been associated with subcortical signals of arousal and prediction resetting. However, it is unclear how the context in which a deviant occurs affects the size of the PDR. Using ecological musical stimuli that we characterised using a computational model, we showed that the PDR to pitch deviants is sensitive to contextual uncertainty (quantified as entropy), whereby the PDR was greater in low than high entropy contexts. The PDR was also positively correlated with unexpectedness of notes. No effects of music expertise were found, suggesting a ceiling effect due to enculturation. These results show that the same sudden environmental change can lead to differing arousal levels depending on contextual factors, providing evidence for a sensitivity of the PDR to long-term context.

neuroscience↗