Maria Teresa Pascarelli

Successful coordination often requires integrating strategic reasoning with real-time observations of others’ actions, yet how humans resolve conflicts between these information sources remains unclear. This study aimed to fill this gap by examining how people coordinate in a strategic game when observing partial kinematic information from their partner’s actions. Participants played a HI-LO game with a virtual partner, choosing payoffs based on grasping movements toward invisible large and small targets. Hand movements were presented as schematic animations, with partners grasping targets linked to higher or lower payoffs across two configurations. Participants relied exclusively on kinematic cues from hand shape changes in maximum grip aperture to infer their partner’s choices. There were two main findings. While participants preferred higher payoffs consistent with rational game-theoretic expectations, reliable kinematic cues overrode these expectations. When early grip aperture changes indicated the partner was reaching for a large target associated with a lower payoff, participants abandoned their default preference for higher payoffs. They chose the lower option instead, achieving a high coordination success rate. These findings demonstrate that people prioritize kinematic cues about others’ choices over theoretical assumptions about rational behavior when coordinating. This suggests that movement-based inferences about others’ actions in natural social interactions may be weighted more heavily than strategic reasoning when the two sources of information conflict.

This study tested the hypothesis of cortical neural efficiency (i.e., reduced brain activation in experts) in the visuospatial information processing related to football (soccer) scenes in football players. Electroencephalographic data were recorded from 56 scalp electrodes in 13 football players and eight matched non-players during the observation of 70 videos with football actions lasting 2.5 s each. During these videos, the central fixation target changed color from red to blue or vice versa. The videos were watched two times. One time, the subjects were asked to estimate the distance between players during each action (FOOTBALL condition, visuospatial). Another time, they had to estimate if the fixation target was colored for a longer time in red or blue color (CONTROL condition, non-visuospatial). The order of the two conditions was pseudo-randomized across the subjects. Cortical activity was estimated as the percent reduction in power of scalp alpha rhythms (about 8-12 Hz) during the videos compared with a pre-video baseline (event-related desynchronization, ERD).In the FOOTBALL condition, a prominent and bilateral parietal alpha ERD (i.e., cortical activation) was greater in the football players than non-players (p < 0.05) in contrast with the neural efficiency hypothesis. In the CONTROL condition, no significant alpha ERD difference was observed. No difference in behavioral response time and accuracy was found between the two groups in any condition.In conclusion, a prominent parietal cortical activity related to visuospatial processes during football scenes was greater in the football players over controls in contrast with the neural efficiency hypothesis. IntroductionPrevious neuroimaging studies using positron emission tomography (PET), single-photon emission computed tomography (SPECT), and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) have mapped the cortical activation during cognitive-motor tasks in humans in relation to intelligent quotient (IQ). Compared with subjects having a low IQ, high-IQ people showed weaker cortical frontoparietal activations during the performance of cognitive tasks (Haier et al., 1988, 1992, 2004; Parks et al., 1988; Rypma et al., 1999, 2002, 2005; Ruff et al., 2003). These results support the concept that the most brilliant individuals are characterized by a reduced and circumscribed activation of the cerebral cortex during cognitive tasks, possibly due to the efficiency of neural populations involved in the related information processing. However, this neural efficiency hypothesis does not explain all experimental data, especially when cognitive tasks are challenging. Other neuroimaging evidence pointed to a greater task-related cortical frontoparietal activation in individuals exhibiting a high cognitive performance than those manifesting a low cognitive performance (Newman et al., 2003; Gray et al., 2003).SPECT, PET, and fMRI allow mapping fine topographical details of the cortical neural efficiency in experts, but they could not explore underlying neurophysiological oscillatory mechanisms. These mechanisms can be probed by the analysis of electroencephalographic (EEG) activity. EEG alpha (about 8-12 Hz) rhythms are typically reduced in amplitude, as a sign of cortical activation, during sensory, motor, and cognitive information processing (alpha event-related desynchronization, ERD; Pfurtscheller and Lopes da Silva, 1999; Klimesch, 2012). As a manifestation of cortical neural efficiency, the alpha ERD is less prominent in people with high IQ during several cognitive and working memory tasks (Neubauer et al., 1995, 1999, 2004; Grabner et al., 2004, 2006). Cortical neural efficiency was also evaluated in élite athletes, considered as high-performing people, with puzzling results. Some EEG studies on alpha rhythms have exhibited findings in agreement with the neural efficiency hypothesis. As a matter of fact, the frontoparietal alpha ERD was lower in karate athletes and gymnasts over controls while watching and judging videos reproducing sporting performances (Babiloni et al., 2009, 2010a). Furthermore, the alpha ERD was lower in gun shooters over controls during shooting preparation (Haufler et al., 2000; Janelle et al., 2000; Loze et al., 2001; Del Percio et al., 2009a). Compare to controls, élite karate athletes also exhibited lower alpha ERD during the opening of eyes in the resting state condition (Del Percio et al., 2011), difficult upright standing with eyes closed (Del Percio et al., 2010), simple voluntary hand movements (Del Percio et al., 2010b), and a mental arithmetic subtraction task (Duru and Assem, 2018). Furthermore, cyclists with high maximal aerobic power showed lower alpha ERD during cycling compared with control subjects (Ludyga et al., 2016). Finally, tennis table experts over novices presented a lower frontoparietal alpha ERD during the imagery of the response to services represented in videos (Wolf et al., 2014). Other EEG studies on alpha rhythms have exhibited findings in contrast with the neural efficiency hypothesis. Tennis table experts over novices showed a greater frontal alpha ERD during the imagery of the response to services represented in videos (Wolf et al., 2014). Furthermore, golf experts displayed greater frontal alpha ERD few seconds before successful than unsuccessful putts (Babiloni et al., 2008; Cooke et al., 2014). They also exhibited greater frontal alpha ERD compared with novices (Cooke et al., 2014). In the same line, the frontal alpha ERD was greater after the unsuccessful putts in the golf experts over the novices, as expected when substantial cognitive sources are allocated for correcting performance parameters in experts (Cooke et al., 2015). Finally, frontal alpha ERD was greater in karate and fencing athletes over controls who were maintaining the equilibrium using visual information about the surrounding environment (Del Percio et al., 2007). The present study tested the...

This study tested the hypothesis of cortical neural efficiency (i.e., reduced brain activation in experts) in the visuospatial information processing related to football (soccer) scenes in football players. Electroencephalographic data were recorded from 56 scalp electrodes in 13 football players and eight matched non-players during the observation of 70 videos with football actions lasting 2.5 s each. During these videos, the central fixation target changed color from red to blue or vice versa. The videos were watched two times. One time, the subjects were asked to estimate the distance between players during each action (FOOTBALL condition, visuospatial). Another time, they had to estimate if the fixation target was colored for a longer time in red or blue color (CONTROL condition, non-visuospatial). The order of the two conditions was pseudo-randomized across the subjects. Cortical activity was estimated as the percent reduction in power of scalp alpha rhythms (about 8–12 Hz) during the videos compared with a pre-video baseline (event-related desynchronization, ERD). In the FOOTBALL condition, a prominent and bilateral parietal alpha ERD (i.e., cortical activation) was greater in the football players than non-players (p < 0.05) in contrast with the neural efficiency hypothesis. In the CONTROL condition, no significant alpha ERD difference was observed. No difference in behavioral response time and accuracy was found between the two groups in any condition. In conclusion, a prominent parietal cortical activity related to visuospatial processes during football scenes was greater in the football players over controls in contrast with the neural efficiency hypothesis.

This study tested whether resting state alpha rhythms (8–13 Hz) may characterize mild cognitive impairment due to Alzheimer’s disease (ADMCI) compared with MCI due to chronic kidney disease (CKDMCI). Clinical and resting state eyes-closed electroence