Characterizing an ERP correlate of intentions understanding using a sequential comic strips paradigm

Abstract

Chronometric properties of theory of mind and intentions understanding more specifically are well documented. Notably, it was demonstrated using magnetoencephalography that the brain regions involved were recruited as soon as 200 ms post-stimulus. We used event-related potentials (ERPs) to characterize an electrophysiological marker of attribution of intentions. We also explored the robustness of this ERP signature under two conditions corresponding to either explicit instructions to focus on others’ intentions or implicit instructions with no reference to mental states. Two matched groups of 16 healthy volunteers each received either explicit or no instructions about intentions and performed a nonverbal attribution of intentions task based on sequential four-image comic strips depicting either intentional or physical causality. A bilateral posterior positive component, ranging from 250 to 650 ms post-stimulus, showed greater amplitude in intentional than in physical condition (the intention ERP effect). This effect occurs during the third image only, suggesting that it reflects the integration of information depicted in the third image to the contextual cues given by the first two. The intention effect was similar in the two groups of subjects. Overall, our results identify a clear ERP marker of the first hundreds of milliseconds of intentions processing probably related to a contextual integrative mechanism and suggest its robustness by showing its blindness to task demands manipulation.

Keywords:

• Event-related potentials
• Attribution of intentions
• Verbal instructions
• Posterior positivity

The authors are thankful to Paul Roux, MD, PhD, Ingrid Chapard, Graziela Zanatta, MD, and Virginie Bulot, MD (Centre Hospitalier de Versailles, Laboratoire ECIPSY Unité EA4047, Versailles), for their help in the recruitment of the participants. We would like to thank Paul Linkowski, MD, PhD (Head of the “Laboratoire de Recherches Psychiatriques, Hôpital Erasme, Bruxelles”), for his support as well as Nathalie Coumans (Scientific Research Worker at the “Fonds de la Recherche Scientifique”) for her helpful comments and technical contribution to the new version of the stimuli. We also thank Thomas Delhaye for the quality of his drawings. Finally, we are thankful to Sylvain Bussière, PhD, and Jessie Cadoret (Québec) for their helpful comments on the manuscript.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Centre Hospitalier de Versailles. The adaptation of the task was in part supported by a grant from the “Fonds de la Recherche Scientifique” as well as from Hôpital Erasme.