Schedule of Events | Symposia

Patterns of low-frequency signals across brain networks reflect differences in attention control

Poster Session A - Saturday, March 29, 2025, 3:00 – 5:00 pm EDT, Back Bay Ballroom/Republic Ballroom

Ms Dolly Seeburger¹ (dseeburger3@gatech.edu), Jason Tsukahara², Nan Xu³, Shella Keilholz¹, Randall Engle¹; ¹Georgia Institute of Technology, ²University of Miami, ³University of Maryland

Patterns of low-frequency signals across functional brain networks are relatively stable (Yousefi & Keilholz, 2021). This reflects a possible trait-level signal. In this individual differences study, participants completed 2 days of a battery of cognitive tasks to assess attention control, working memory, and fluid intelligence as a latent factor. We then obtained fMRI scans during rest, 1-back and 3-back task. Attention control latent factor, and not working memory or fluid intelligence, significantly predicted differences in the connectivity between fronto-parietal and dorsal attention network as well as fronto-parietal and the default mode network. Moreoever, the locus coeruleus, a region thought to be the nexus of attention control (Tsukahara & Engle 2021), was positively correlated with the activity in the fronto-parietal control network in high attention individuals but negatively correlated in low attention control individuals. This suggests that high attention control individuals have better network switching of the fronto parietal to the dorsal attention from the default mode network, when cognitive load increase possibly influenced by the locus coeruleus. Furthermore, we investigate the activity of the locus coeruleus and how it relates with trait level attention control.

Topic Area: ATTENTION: Other