Cardiorespiratory fitness modulates prestimulus EEG microstates during a sustained attention task
DOI: 10.3389/fnins.2023.1188695
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Summary
This study investigates the relationship between cardiorespiratory fitness (CRF) and prestimulus electrocortical dynamics during sustained attention tasks. While previous research established that higher CRF correlates with better sustained attention performance, most studies focused on post-stimulus brain activity. This research addresses a gap by examining EEG microstates in the two seconds preceding stimulus onset, hypothesizing that higher CRF would be associated with reduced default mode network (DMN) activity (microstate C) and increased dorsal frontoparietal network (DAN) activity (microstate D). The study utilized data from 65 healthy adults (aged 18–37) who performed a 30-minute psychomotor vigilance task (PVT) while undergoing EEG recording. CRF was assessed via maximal oxygen consumption (VO2max). Researchers analyzed prestimulus EEG epochs using k-means clustering to identify five distinct microstate classes (A–E). Statistical analyses included correlation tests between microstate parameters and VO2max, and multilevel mixed-effects models to examine associations between microstate dynamics and PVT response times. Results indicated that higher CRF was significantly associated with a shorter duration of microstate A and a higher frequency of occurrence of microstate D in the prestimulus period. Regarding performance, increased global field power and occurrence of microstate A correlated with slower response times. Conversely, greater global explained variance, time coverage, and occurrence of microstate D were linked to faster response times. Microstate C parameters (GEV, GFP, duration, coverage, and occurrence) were consistently associated with slower response times, indicating poorer sustained attention. However, contrary to the hypothesis, microstate C prevalence did not correlate with CRF levels, suggesting that while DMN activity impacts performance, its modulation is not directly driven by fitness levels in this context. The findings demonstrate that individuals with higher cardiorespiratory fitness exhibit distinct prestimulus electrocortical patterns, specifically characterized by enhanced microstate D dynamics. These patterns are associated with faster reaction times, suggesting that higher CRF facilitates more efficient allocation of attentional resources prior to stimulus onset. The study highlights the role of prestimulus brain states in sustained attention and provides evidence that physical fitness modulates the neural readiness mechanisms underlying cognitive performance, independent of post-stimulus processing.
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| Stage | Outcome | Tool | Model | Prompt | Attempts | Completed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| discover | success | Crossref | — | — | 1 | 2026-08-09 |
| archive | success | canonical_url | — | — | 1 | 2026-08-09 |
| extract | success | cached | — | — | 4 | 2026-08-10 |
| clean | success | clean | — | — | 1 | 2026-08-09 |
| chunk | success | chunk | — | — | 1 | 2026-08-09 |
| embed | success | embed | Qwen/Qwen3-Embedding-8B | — | 1 | 2026-08-09 |
| promote | success | — | — | — | 1 | 2026-08-09 |
| summarize | success | llm | qwen3.6-27b-nvidia | summ-v5 | 2 | 2026-08-10 |
| tag | success | vector_similarity | — | — | 11 | 2026-08-11 |
| verify | success | — | — | — | 2 | 2026-08-10 |
Summary generated by qwen3.6-27b-nvidia on 2026-08-10; verification: verified.
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- Empirical Findings: physiological data