Impact of pressure as a tactile stimulus on working memory in healthy participants

Dehghan Nayyeri Mahboobeh, Burgmer Markus, Pfleiderer Bettina

Abstract

Studies on cross-modal interaction have demonstrated attenuated as well as facilitatedeffects for both neural responses as well as behavioral performance. The goals of this pilotstudy were to investigate possible cross-modal interactions of tactile stimulation on visualworking memory and to identify possible neuronal correlates by using functional magneticresonance imaging (fMRI). During fMRI, participants (n = 12 females, n = 12 males) performeda verbal n-back task (0-back and 2-back tasks) while tactile pressure to the leftthumbnail was delivered. Participants presented significantly lower behavioral performances(increased error rates, and reaction times) during the 2-back task as compared tothe 0-back task. Task performance was independent of pressure in both tasks. This meansthat working memory performance was not impacted by a low salient tactile stimulus. Also inthe fMRI data, no significant interactions of n-back x pressure were observed. In conclusion,the current study found no influence of tactile pressure on task-related brain activity duringn-back (0-back and 2-back) tasks.