Sensitivity of functional tympanic membrane thermometry (fTMT) as an index of hemispheric activation in cognition
- 12 April 2007
- journal article
- research article
- Published by Taylor & Francis Ltd in Laterality
- Vol. 12 (3), 239-261
- https://doi.org/10.1080/13576500701218345
Abstract
The measure of hemispheric activation in cognitive and clinical studies remains out of reach of many scientists due to cost, analysis complexity, and practical consideration of the techniques available such as fMRI, EEG, or EMG. The present study was conducted to determine whether infrared functional tympanic membrane thermometry (fTMT) is a measure of lateralised activation sensitive enough to be used in typical cognitive and clinical experiments. A total of 24 participants had their tympanic membrane temperature measured while performing a letter-matching task. Activation in the two hemispheres was manipulated by changing the proportion of matches occurring in the left and right visual fields and by varying the task complexity. Changes in fTMT due to the greater proportion of matches presented in one visual field and due to the modulation in task complexity were detected. These findings suggest that fTMT is a measure of broad lateralised cerebral activation sensitive enough for use in typical psychological studies.Keywords
This publication has 30 references indexed in Scilit:
- Sex differences in cerebral laterality of language and visuospatial processingBrain and Language, 2006
- Efficiency of callosal transfer and hemispheric interaction.Neuropsychology, 2006
- Cognition is cool: Can hemispheric activation be assessed by tympanic membrane thermometry?Brain and Cognition, 2004
- Cerebral specialization and interhemispheric communication: Does the corpus callosum enable the human condition?Brain, 2000
- Anatomical-behavioral relationships: Corpus callosum morphometry and hemispheric specializationBehavioural Brain Research, 1994
- Lateralized Increases in Cerebral Blood Flow during Performance of Verbal and Spatial Tasks: Relationship with Performance LevelBrain and Cognition, 1994
- Individual differences in brain asymmetries and fiber composition in the human corpus callosumBrain Research, 1992
- Interhemispheric interaction affected by computational complexityNeuropsychologia, 1992
- Letter matching in the hemispheres: Speed-accuracy trade-offsNeuropsychologia, 1992
- MATCHING, MAXIMIZING, AND HILL‐CLIMBINGJournal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 1983