BLAST: A short computerized test to measure the ability to stay on task. Normative behavioral data and detailed cortical dynamics.

Mathilde Petton (1) , Marcela Perrone-Bertolotti (2) , Diego Mac-Auliffe (1) , Olivier Bertrand (1) , Pierre-Emmanuel Aguera (1) , Florian Sipp (1) , Manik Batthacharjee (3) , Jean Isnard (4) , Lorella Minotti (3, 5) , Sylvain Rheims (1, 4) , Philippe Kahane (3, 5) , Vania Herbillon (1) , Jean-Philippe Lachaux (1)

1 CRNL - Centre de recherche en neurosciences de Lyon - Lyon Neuroscience Research Center
2 LPNC - Laboratoire de Psychologie et NeuroCognition
3 GIN - [GIN] Grenoble Institut des Neurosciences
4 Service de Neurologie Fonctionnelle et Epileptologie [HCL, Lyon]
5 Hôpital Michallon - Service de Neurologie [CHU Grenoble-Alpes]

This article provides an exhaustive description of a new short computerized test to assess on a second-to-second basis the ability of individuals to « stay on task », that is, to apply selectively and repeatedly task-relevant cognitive processes. The task (Bron/Lyon Attention Stability Test, or BLAST) lasts around 1 min, and measures repeatedly the time to find a target letter in a two-by-two letter array, with an update of all letters every new trial across thirty trials. Several innovative psychometric measures of attention stability are proposed based on the instantaneous fluctuations of reaction times throughout the task, and normative data stratified over a wide range of age are provided by a large (>6000) dataset of participants aged 8 to 70. We also detail the large-scale brain dynamics supporting the task from an in-depth study of 32 participants with direct electrophysiological cortical recordings (intracranial EEG) to prove that BLAST involves critically large-scale executive attention networks, with a marked activation of the dorsal attention network and a deactivation of the default-mode network. Accordingly, we show that BLAST performance correlates with scores established by ADHD-questionnaires.

Mots clés: ECoG; Intracranial EEG; ADHD; Neuropsychological test; Normative data; Executive functions; Attention

Domaines: Psychologie; Neurosciences

Mathilde Petton, Marcela Perrone-Bertolotti, Diego Mac-Auliffe, Olivier Bertrand, Pierre-Emmanuel Aguera, et al.. BLAST: A short computerized test to measure the ability to stay on task. Normative behavioral data and detailed cortical dynamics.. Neuropsychologia, 2019, 107151, [Epub ahead of print]. ⟨10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2019.107151⟩. ⟨hal-02293851⟩