Modifying temporal expectations: Changing cortical responsivity to delayed self-initiated sensations with training

Abstract

The perceptual system makes a specific prediction regarding the timing of impending, self-initiated sensations to facilitate the attenuation of these sensations. The current study used electroencephalography to investigate whether temporal expectations can be modified with training. Participants underwent a button-press-for-tone task and evoked responses to the tones were measured. Fifty participants were randomly assigned to receive repeated exposure (training) to either immediate tones, or tones delayed by 100ms. Pre-training, N1 amplitude to delayed tones was significantly larger compared to immediate tones. However, while training to the immediate tone maintained a significant difference in N1 amplitude between the immediate and delayed tones post-training, this difference was eliminated when trained to the delayed tone. This suggests that participants' neural expectations regarding the anticipated timing of self-generated sensations can be modified with behavioural training. This result has implications for alleviating the subnormal sensory attenuation which has been observed in patients with schizophrenia.

Keywords: Corollary discharge; Event-Related Potential (ERP); N1-suppression; Sensory attenuation; Temporal expectation.