Objective estimation of the state of content understanding by near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) (特集脳機能計測と基礎心理学)

概要

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Three experiments used near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) to examine brain activation in the frontal cortex during comprehending and reporting the contents of a story. In Experiment 1, the participants were asked to view humorous comic strip stories under the following two conditions: comprehending and reporting the contents after the experiment (report condition), and not reporting the contents (non-report condition). The changes of Oxy-Hb concentration in the left prefrontal region were higher in the report condition than in the non-report condition. In Experiments 2A and 2B the participants were asked to arrange sets of cards, according to either story development or shape complexity, without reporting the content of the story. The changes of Oxy-Hb concentration in the left and right prefrontal regions were higher for card arrangements related to story development than for those related to shape complexity. When articulatory suppression was used, activation in part of the left prefrontal region was reduced. The anterior portion of the left inferior frontal gyrus (around BA47) was consistently activated when participants actively tried to understand content, regardless of the type of task and memory load. We suggest a new objective method, using NIRS, with which to measure the brain activity associated with trying to understand content.
2009-09-30