Frontiers in Psychology (Mar 2020)

EEG Correlates of Involuntary Cognitions in the Reflexive Imagery Task

  • Wei Dou,
  • Allison K. Allen,
  • Hyein Cho,
  • Hyein Cho,
  • Sabrina Bhangal,
  • Alexander J. Cook,
  • Ezequiel Morsella,
  • Ezequiel Morsella,
  • Mark W. Geisler

DOI
https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.00482
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 11

Abstract

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The Reflexive Imagery Task (RIT) reveals that the activation of sets can result in involuntary cognitions that are triggered by external stimuli. In the basic RIT, subjects are presented with an image of an object (e.g., CAT) and instructed to not think of the name of the object. Involuntary subvocalizations of the name (the RIT effect) arise on roughly 80% of the trials. We conducted an electroencephalography (EEG) study to explore the neural correlates of the RIT effect. Subjects were presented with one object at a time in one condition and two objects simultaneously in another condition. Five regions were defined by electrode sites: frontal (F3–F4), parietal (P3–P4), temporal (T3–T4), right hemisphere (F4–P4), and left hemisphere (F3–P3). We focused on the alpha (8–13 Hz), beta (13–30 Hz), delta (0.01–4 Hz), and theta (4–8 Hz) frequencies.

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