Ricerc@Sapienza

Our objective was to investigate the capacity to control a P3-based brain-computer interface (BCI) device for communication and its related (temporal) attention processing in a sample of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) patients with respect to healthy subjects. The ultimate goal was to corroborate the role of cognitive mechanisms in event-related potential (ERP)-based BCI control in ALS patients. Furthermore, the possible differences in such attentional mechanisms between the two groups were investigated in order to unveil possible alterations associated with the ALS condition.

In the study of the electrophysiological correlates of attention, a phasic change in alertness has been classically related to a negative frontal-central shift called Contingent Negative Variation (CNV). Studies investigating the effects of meditation on the CNV in participants reporting frequent transcendental experiences (TE) reported reduced CNV in choice reaction time task (CRT), and increased CNV in simple reaction time task (SRT), suggesting that meditation can induce a more balanced attentional state.