Comparison of Cortical Effects for Feedback on Motor Imagery-based Brain-computer Interface using Event-related Design: EEG-fNIRS Study

Abstract

While most studies believed that false feedback of motor imagery-based brain computer interfaces (MI-BCI) is crucial for inducing brain plasticity, few studies demonstrated the effect of false feedback. Moreover, there is no study that figure out relationship between false feedback and brain activation which can induce brain plasticity. In this study, we examined the cortical effect of MI-BCI with different feedback compared to conventional motor learning method, passive training and active training, using electroencephalogram and function-al near-infrared spectroscopy simultaneously. By comparing paradigm with different feedback, the effect of false feedback can be investigated indirectly. In addition, by comparing each type of trials with and without a false feedback in last period, the effect of false feedback can be also investigated directly. According to the experimental results, which almost subjects cannot induce much higher cortical activation in paradigm with false feedback than paradigm without false feedback, we can concluded that false feedback might be disrupted for concentrating their own motor imagery tasks and overall results demonstrate that reduction of false feedback may be important for inducing subjects’ higher cortical activation.