Claire Kabdebon, Ana Flo, Adélaïde de Heering, Richard Aslin (2022). The power of rhythms: how steady-state evoked responses reveal early neurocognitive development, NeuroImage, 119150, doi: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2022.119150.

Résumé :
Abstract: Electroencephalography (EEG) is a non-invasive and painless recording of cerebral activity, particularly well-suited for studying young infants, allowing the inspection of cerebral responses in a constellation of different ways. Of particular interest for developmental cognitive neuroscientists is the use of rhythmic stimulation, and the analysis of steady-state evoked potentials (SS-EPs) – an approach also known as frequency tagging. In this paper we rely on the existing SS-EP early developmental literature to illustrate the important advantages of SS-EPs for studying the developing brain. We argue that (1) the technique is both objective and predictive: the response is expected at the stimulation frequency (and/or higher harmonics), (2) its high spectral specificity makes the computed responses particularly robust to artifacts, and (3) the technique allows for short and efficient recordings, compatible with infants’ limited attentional spans. We additionally provide an overview of some recent inspiring use of the SS-EP technique in adult research, in order to argue that (4) the SS-EP approach can be implemented creatively to target a wide range of cognitive and neural processes. For all these reasons, we expect SS-EPs to play an increasing role in the understanding of early cognitive processes. Finally, we provide practical guidelines for implementing and analyzing SS-EP studies.

Matthieu Koroma, Maxime Elbaz, Damien Léger, Sid Kouider (2022). Learning New Vocabulary Implicitly During Sleep Transfers With Cross-Modal Generalization Into Wakefulness, Frontiers in Neuroscience, 16, 10.3389/fnins.2022.801666

Résumé :

New information can be learned during sleep but the extent to which we can access this knowledge after awakening is far less understood. Using a novel Associative Transfer Learning paradigm, we show that, after hearing unknown Japanese words with sounds referring to their meaning during sleep, participants could identify the images depicting the meaning of newly acquired Japanese words after awakening (N = 22). Moreover, we demonstrate that this cross-modal generalization is implicit, meaning that participants remain unaware of this knowledge. Using electroencephalography, we further show that frontal slow-wave responses to auditory stimuli during sleep predicted memory performance after awakening. This neural signature of memory formation gradually emerged over the course of the sleep phase, highlighting the dynamics of associative learning during sleep. This study provides novel evidence that the formation of new associative memories can be traced back to the dynamics of slow-wave responses to stimuli during sleep and that their implicit transfer into wakefulness can be generalized across sensory modalities.

Emma De Araujo, Sacha Altay, Alexander Bor, Hugo Mercier (2022). Dominant Jerks : People Infer Dominance from the Utterance of Challenging and Offensive Statements, Social Psychological Bulletin, 16, no. 4

Résumé :
Could there be upsides to rudely challenging people’s positions? If no one calls out the speaker of a challenging or offensive statement, it might be because the audience is afraid to challenge the speaker, thereby suggesting the speaker holds a dominant position. In two experiments (N = 635), participants read vignettes in which a speaker uttered a statement that was challenging (it directly clashed with the audience’s prior views) or unchallenging (it agreed with the audience’s prior views). We also manipulated whether the audience accepted or rejected the statement after it was uttered. In Experiment 1 the statements were about mundane topics, while in Experiment 2 the statements were offensive. In both experiments, speakers uttering challenging statements that the audience nonetheless accepted were deemed more dominant and more likely to be the boss of the audience members. This shows that people use audience reactions to challenging statements to infer dominance, and suggests that people might use the utterance of challenging statements to demonstrate their dominance.

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