Abstract
Executive functioning encompasses some core cognitive qualities like taking the appropriate time to think before acting on a decision, efficiently dealing with novel and unanticipated challenges, resisting temptations and staying focused. Response inhibition, conflict control, working memory, and cognitive flexibility are some of the sub-cognitive processes which have a detrimental effect on the executive functioning of an individual. There has been considerable amount of research on different methods/interventions through which executive functioning could be enhanced through time. But the effect of high-frequency binaural beats on executive functioning is lacking and much needed in literature. The objective of the present study was to evaluate the effect of single-session, high-frequency binaural beats on executive functioning in healthy adults. Subjects recruited were divided into two groups: experimental and control. Participants in the experimental group were subjected to beta frequency binaural beats (25 Hz) for 20 min. Both the groups then executed a computerized version of the Stroop task. Behavioral measures (Accuracy, reaction time) and various Event related potentials (ERP) features like P300 and N400 were extracted and considered for analysis. Data analysis revealed that the participants in the experimental group recorded higher accuracy and slower reaction times in the Stroop task compared to the control group. The behavioral results were also complemented by higher averaged P300 amplitudes and lower N400 amplitudes recorded for the experimental group compared to the control group. We intend to use these results as substantial evidence to imply high-frequency binaural beats as an effective means of enhancement of executive functioning in healthy adults over sham-controlled, longitudinal studies.
Keywords
- Binaural beats
- Stroop task
- Event related potentials
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Acknowledgements
This research was supported by a grant from the Defence Research and Development Organization (DRDO) titled “Vision Research in Cognitive Neuroscience” (ST-14/DIPR-734) to Dr. Sushil Chandra.
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Mahajan, R., Daniel, R.V., Rao, A.K., Pandey, V., Chauhan, R.P., Chandra, S. (2021). Does Single-Session, High-Frequency Binaural Beats Effect Executive Functioning in Healthy Adults? An ERP Study. In: Dave, M., Garg, R., Dua, M., Hussien, J. (eds) Proceedings of the International Conference on Paradigms of Computing, Communication and Data Sciences. Algorithms for Intelligent Systems. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-7533-4_20
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-7533-4_20
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