Assessing changes in brain electrical activity and functional connectivity while overtaking a vehicle

ABSTRACT

Driving is a daily requirement and an indispensable activity for many people. However, still little is known about how driving is supported by the brain. We used electroencephalography to study the changes in brain activity and its functional connectivity in a simulated driving task. We focused on overtaking and studied this activity in three phases: before overtake, during overtake, and after overtake. Our results showed that mu power in motor and sensorimotor areas decreased during overtake and again increased after overtake. On the other hand, beta oscillations in frontal areas were at their highest level in the “before overtake” phase. It can be interpreted that the “before overtake” was the most attention-demanding phase. In addition, we found that the connectivity between right and left prefrontal regions and right and left occipital regions in alpha (and mu) band power was significantly stronger in the “during overtake” compared to the other two conditions.

KEYWORDS:

• Driving
• EEG
• brain activity
• oscillatory power
• functional connectivity

Acknowledgements

This research is partially supported by the cognitive sciences and technologies council grant (#4448).

Authors’ contributions: AD designed the experiment, undertook the data collection, analysed the data, interpreted the results, and drafted the manuscript. FT revised the manuscript. FT helped to interpret the results and revised the manuscript. JF contributed to the experimental design and provided critical comments, also helped to interpret the results, and revised the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Cognitive Sciences and Technologies Council [Grant Number 4448].