Influence of living settings on physical activity levels and volition in exercise in male and female university students.

This study explored the influence of living settings on physical activity (PA) levels and volition in exercise and their correlation, considering sex differences. Five hundred and sixty-six university students (261 rural and 305 urban) from Calabria region (Italy) attending universities courses filled an online survey where Global Physical Activity Questionnaire and Volition in Exercise Questionnaire were administered. Rural females (RF) showed lower PA levels and self-confidence than rural males (RM) (p<0.01). Postponing training and unrelated thoughts were higher in RF than RM (p<0.01 and p<0.05 respectively). PA levels, self-confidence and coping with failure were lower in urban females (UF) than urban males (UM) (p<0.01), Postponing training and unrelated thoughts were higher in UF than UM (p<0.01 and p<0.05). In RF and UF, PA levels positively correlated with self-confidence (Rho = 0.397) and coping with failure (Rho = 0.330), whereas negatively correlated with postponing training (Rho = -0.487) and unrelated thoughts (Rho = -0.283). In RM and UM, PA levels positively correlated with self-confidence (Rho = 0.270) and coping with failure (Rho = 0.258), whereas it negatively correlated with postponing training (Rho = -0.285). PA levels positively correlated with reasons (Rho = 0.260) only in UM. We showed for the first time the relationship between PA and volition factors considering the living setting in university students. Sex differences were observed in some volition facilitators and PA levels independently by the living context.

Volitional modulation of neuronal activity in the external globus pallidus by engagement of the cortical-basal ganglia circuit.

Volitional modulation of neural activity is not confined to the cortex but extends to various brain regions. Yet, it remains unclear whether neurons in the basal ganglia structure, the external globus pallidus (GPe), can be volitionally controlled. Here, we employed a volitional conditioning task to compare the volitional modulation of GPe and primary motor cortex (M1) neurons as well as the underlying circuits and control mechanisms. The results revealed that the volitional modulation of GPe neuronal activity engaged both M1 and substantia nigra pars reticulata (SNr) neurons, indicating the involvement of the cortex-GPe-SNr loop. In contrast, the volitional modulation of M1 neurons primarily occurred through the engagement of M1 local circuitry. Furthermore, lesioning M1 neurons did not affect the volitional learning or volitional control signal in GPe, whereas lesioning of GPe neurons impaired the learning process for the volitional modulation of M1 neuronal activity at the intermediate stage. Additionally, lesion of GPe neurons enhanced M1 neuronal activity when performing the volitional control task without reward delivery and a random reward test. Taken together, our findings demonstrated that GPe neurons could be volitionally controlled by engagement of the cortical-basal ganglia circuit and inhibit learning process for the volitional modulation of M1 neuronal activity by regulating M1 neuronal activity. Thus, GPe neurons can be effectively harnessed for independent volitional modulation for neurorehabilitation in patients with cortical damage. KEY POINTS: The cortical-basal ganglia circuit contributes to the volitional modulation of GPe neurons. Volitional modulation of M1 neuronal activity mainly engages M1 local circuitry. Bilateral GPe lesioning impedes volitional learning at the intermediate stages. Lesioning of GPe neurons inhibits volitional learning process by regulating M1 neuronal activity.

Human Cervical Epidural Spinal Electrogram Topographically Maps Distinct Volitional Movements.

Little is known about the electrophysiologic activity of the intact human spinal cord during volitional movement. We analyzed epidural spinal recordings from a total of five human subjects of both sexes during a variety of upper extremity movements and found that these spinal epidural electrograms contain spectral information distinguishing periods of movement, rest, and sensation. Cervical epidural electrograms also contained spectral changes time-locked with movement. We found that these changes were primarily associated with increased power in the theta (4-8 Hz) band and feature increased theta phase to gamma amplitude coupling, and this increase in theta power can be used to topographically map distinct upper extremity movements onto the cervical spinal cord in accordance with established myotome maps of the upper extremity. Our findings have implications for the development of neurostimulation protocols and devices focused on motor rehabilitation for the upper extremity, and the approach presented here may facilitate spatiotemporal mapping of naturalistic movements.

Instantaneous phase of rhythmic behaviour under volitional control.

The phase of signals representing cyclic behavioural patterns provides valuable information for understanding the mechanisms driving the observed behaviours. Methods usually adopted to estimate the phase, which are based on projecting the signal onto the complex plane, have strict requirements on its frequency content, which limits their application. To overcome these limitations, input signals can be processed using band-pass filters or decomposition techniques. In this paper, we briefly review these approaches and propose a new one. Our approach is based on the principles of Empirical Mode Decomposition (EMD), but unlike EMD, it does not aim to decompose the input signal. This avoids the many problems that can occur when extracting a signal's components one by one. The proposed approach estimates the phase of experimental signals that have one main oscillatory component modulated by slower activity and perturbed by weak, sparse, or random activity at faster time scales. We illustrate how our approach works by estimating the phase dynamics of synthetic signals and real-world signals representing knee angles during flexion/extension activity, heel height during gait, and the activity of different organs involved in speech production.

Aphantasia and involuntary imagery.

Aphantasia is a condition that is often characterized as the impaired ability to create voluntary mental images. Aphantasia is assumed to selectively affect voluntary imagery mainly because even though aphantasics report being unable to visualize something at will, many report having visual dreams. We argue that this common characterization of aphantasia is incorrect. Studies on aphantasia are often not clear about whether they are assessing voluntary or involuntary imagery, but some studies show that several forms of involuntary imagery are also affected in aphantasia (including imagery in dreams). We also raise problems for two attempts to show that involuntary images are preserved in aphantasia. In addition, we report the results of a study about afterimages in aphantasia, which suggest that these tend to be less intense in aphantasics than in controls. Involuntary imagery is often treated as a unitary kind that is either present or absent in aphantasia. We suggest that this approach is mistaken and that we should look at different types of involuntary imagery case by case. Doing so reveals no evidence of preserved involuntary imagery in aphantasia. We suggest that a broader characterization of aphantasia, as a deficit in forming mental imagery, whether voluntary or not, is more appropriate. Characterizing aphantasia as a volitional deficit is likely to lead researchers to give incorrect explanations for aphantasia, and to look for the wrong mechanisms underlying it.

Volition motivates cognitive performance at the response-execution level by attenuating task-irrelevant motor activations.

Humans express volition by making voluntary choices which, relative to forced choices, can motivate cognitive performance in a variety of tasks. However, a task that requires the generation of motor responses on the basis of external sensory stimulation involves complex underlying cognitive processes, e.g., pre-response processing, response selection, and response execution. The present study investigated how these underlying processes are facilitated by voluntary choice-making. In five experiments, participants were free or forced to choose a task-irrelevant picture from two alternatives, and then completed a conflict task, i.e., Flanker, Stroop, Simon, Stroop-Simon, or Flanker-Simon task, where the conflict effect could occur at different processing levels. Results consistently showed that responses in all tasks were generally faster after voluntary (vs. forced) choices. Importantly, the conflict effect at the response-execution level (i.e., the Simon effect), but not the conflict effect at the pre-response and response-selection levels (i.e., the Flanker and Stroop effects), was reduced by the voluntary choice-making. Model fitting revealed that the peak amplitude of automatic motor activations in the response-execution conflict was smaller after voluntary (vs. forced) choices. These findings suggest that volition motivates subsequent cognitive performance at the response-execution level by attenuating task-irrelevant motor activations.

Free will: An Example of the Dopaminergic System.

Neuroscience has convinced people that much of their behavior is determined by causes unknown to them and beyond their control. However, are advances in neuroscience truly a prerequisite for such beliefs? Robert Kane's theory of ultimate responsibility is libertarian theory. Its innovative nature makes it possible to discuss the neurophysiological basis of its postulates. Using the functions of the midbrain dopaminergic system as an example, this article provides an overview of this neurophysiological basis. According to Kane, if we are to be ultimately responsible for our wills as well as for our actions, some actions in our lives must lack sufficient motives and causes. These are self-forming actions. Dopamine is hypothesized to mediate self-forming action execution. Dopamine not only mediates action but also ensures synaptic plasticity in the brain, that is, learning from action; hence, dopamine changes the acting individual and provides the formation of our own wills. The basal ganglia, which are the main target of dopamine in the brain, act through parallel pathways and are involved in decision-making processes. Dopamine is also involved in the regulation of the neurodynamical properties of prefrontal cortex networks with random spiking noise. It can be assumed that the activity of the dopaminergic system is closely related to the physiological basis of free will.

A Single-Cell Transcriptomic Analysis of the Mouse Hippocampus After Voluntary Exercise.

Exercise has been recognized as a beneficial factor for cognitive health, particularly in relation to the hippocampus, a vital brain region responsible for learning and memory. Previous research has demonstrated that exercise-mediated improvement of learning and memory in humans and rodents correlates with increased adult neurogenesis and processes related to enhanced synaptic plasticity. Nevertheless, the underlying molecular mechanisms are not fully understood. With the aim to further elucidate these mechanisms, we provide a comprehensive dataset of the mouse hippocampal transcriptome at the single-cell level after 4 weeks of voluntary wheel-running. Our analysis provides a number of interesting observations. For example, the results suggest that exercise affects adult neurogenesis by accelerating the maturation of a subpopulation of Prdm16-expressing neurons. Moreover, we uncover the existence of an intricate crosstalk among multiple vital signaling pathways such as NF-κB, Wnt/ß-catenin, Notch, and retinoic acid (RA) pathways altered upon exercise in a specific cluster of excitatory neurons within the Cornu Ammonis (CA) region of the hippocampus. In conclusion, our study provides an important resource dataset and sheds further light on the molecular changes induced by exercise in the hippocampus. These findings have implications for developing targeted interventions aimed at optimizing cognitive health and preventing age-related cognitive decline.

'It's satisfying but destructive': A qualitative study on the experience of bedtime procrastination in new career starters.

BACKGROUND: Bedtime procrastination, the volitional delay of going to bed without any external circumstances causing the delay, is linked to multiple indicators of inadequate sleep. Intervening to reduce bedtime procrastination may be an important avenue to improve sleep outcomes, yet the phenomenon remains poorly understood in populations at risk for bedtime procrastination. New career starters, those who have graduated from tertiary education and started a new full-time job within the past 12 months, may be susceptible to problematic bedtime procrastination and are at an opportune time for a 'fresh start' to change behaviour. AIMS: The objectives of this study were to understand how bedtime procrastination is experienced and perceived by new career starters, to identify the enablers and barriers to behaviour change in new career starters and to explore themes for future interventions. MATERIALS & METHODS: Data were collected through in-depth semi-structured interviews with 28 participants. RESULTS: Inductive thematic analysis was used to find seven themes: (1) negative feelings before and during bedtime procrastination; (2) wanting to versus knowing I shouldn't; (3) difficulty falling asleep; (4) influence of automatic processes; (5) consequences of bedtime procrastination; (6) lack of self-control and (7) technology captures late-night attention. Participants emphasised the need for me-time, self-negotiation to continue procrastinating and knowledge of the value of sleep. DISCUSSION & CONCLUSION: Findings suggest that bedtime procrastination involves both reflective and automatic cognitive processes. Future interventions would benefit from a dual-process approach, using cognitive and behavioural techniques to reduce bedtime procrastination.

The place of Free Will: the freedom of the prisoner.

Debates about the concept of Free Will date back to ancient times. About 40 years ago, Benjamin Libet designed an experiment showing that the conscious intention to move is preceded by a specific pattern of brain activation. His finding suggested that unconscious processes determine our decisions. Libet-style experiments have continued to dominate the debate about Free Will, pushing some authors to argue that the existence of Free Will is a mere illusion. We believe that this dispute is because we often measure Free Will using arbitrary human decisions rather than deliberate actions. After reviewing the definition of Free Will and the related literature, we conclude that the scientific evidence does not disprove the existence of Free Will. However, our will encounters several constraints and limitations that should be considered when evaluating our deeds' personal responsibility.

Libet's legacy: A primer to the neuroscience of volition.

The neuroscience of volition is an emerging subfield of the brain sciences, with hundreds of papers on the role of consciousness in action formation published each year. This makes the state-of-the-art in the discipline poorly accessible to newcomers and difficult to follow even for experts in the field. Here we provide a comprehensive summary of research in this field since its inception that will be useful to both groups. We also discuss important ideas that have received little coverage in the literature so far. We systematically reviewed a set of 2220 publications, with detailed consideration of almost 500 of the most relevant papers. We provide a thorough introduction to the seminal work of Benjamin Libet from the 1960s to 1980s. We also discuss common criticisms of Libet's method, including temporal introspection, the interpretation of the assumed physiological correlates of volition, and various conceptual issues. We conclude with recent advances and potential future directions in the field, highlighting modern methodological approaches to volition, as well as important recent findings.

The benefit of making voluntary choices generalizes across multiple effectors.

It has been shown that cognitive performance could be improved by expressing volition (e.g., making voluntary choices), which necessarily involves the execution of action through a certain effector. However, it is unclear if the benefit of expressing volition can generalize across different effectors. In the present study, participants made a choice between two pictures either voluntarily or forcibly, and subsequently completed a visual search task with the chosen picture as a task-irrelevant background. The effector for choosing a picture could be the hand (pressing a key), foot (pedaling), mouth (commanding), or eye (gazing), whereas the effector for responding to the search target was always the hand. Results showed that participants responded faster and had a more liberal response criterion in the search task after a voluntary choice (vs. a forced choice). Importantly, the improved performance was observed regardless of which effector was used in making the choice, and regardless of whether the effector for making choices was the same as or different from the effector for responding to the search target. Eye-movement data for oculomotor choice showed that the main contributor to the facilitatory effect of voluntary choice was the post-search time in the visual search task (i.e., the time spent on processes after the target was found, such as response selection and execution). These results suggest that the expression of volition may involve the motor control system in which the effector-general, high-level processing of the goal of the voluntary action plays a key role.

Autonomous behaviour and the limits of human volition.

Humans and some other animals can autonomously generate action choices that contribute to solving complex problems. However, experimental investigations of the cognitive bases of human autonomy are challenging, because experimental paradigms typically constrain behaviour using controlled contexts, and elicit behaviour by external triggers. In contrast, autonomy and freedom imply unconstrained behaviour initiated by endogenous triggers. Here we propose a new theoretical construct of adaptive autonomy, meaning the capacity to make behavioural choices that are free from constraints of both immediate external triggers and of routine response patterns, but nevertheless show appropriate coordination with the environment. Participants (N = 152) played a competitive game in which they had to choose the right time to act, in the face of an opponent who punished (in separate blocks) either choice biases (such as always responding early), sequential patterns of action timing across trials (such as early, late, early, late…), or predictable action-outcome dependence (such as win-stay, lose-shift). Adaptive autonomy was quantified as the ability to maintain performance when each of these influences on action selection was punished. We found that participants could become free from habitual choices regarding when to act and could also become free from sequential action patterns. However, they were not able to free themselves from influences of action-outcome dependence, even when these resulted in poor performance. These results point to a new concept of autonomous behaviour as flexible adaptation of voluntary action choices in a way that avoids stereotypy. In a sequential analysis, we also demonstrated that participants increased their reliance on belief learning in which they attempt to understand the competitor's beliefs and intentions, when transition bias and reinforcement bias were punished. Taken together, our study points to a cognitive mechanism of adaptive autonomy in which competitive interactions with other agents could promote both social cognition and volition in the form of non-stereotyped action choices.

The neural basis of mental navigation in rats.

A brain-machine interface demonstrates volitional control of hippocampal activity.

Volitional activation of remote place representations with a hippocampal brain-machine interface.

The hippocampus is critical for recollecting and imagining experiences. This is believed to involve voluntarily drawing from hippocampal memory representations of people, events, and places, including maplike representations of familiar environments. However, whether representations in such "cognitive maps" can be volitionally accessed is unknown. We developed a brain-machine interface to test whether rats can do so by controlling their hippocampal activity in a flexible, goal-directed, and model-based manner. We found that rats can efficiently navigate or direct objects to arbitrary goal locations within a virtual reality arena solely by activating and sustaining appropriate hippocampal representations of remote places. This provides insight into the mechanisms underlying episodic memory recall, mental simulation and planning, and imagination and opens up possibilities for high-level neural prosthetics that use hippocampal representations.

Effects of a Web-Based Behavioral Activation Intervention on Depressive Symptoms, Activation, Motivation, and Volition: Results of a Randomized Controlled Trial.

INTRODUCTION: Behavioral activation (BA) is effective for the treatment of depression. The Health Action Process Approach (HAPA), which is derived from health psychology, can provide a motivational-volitional framework of BA. OBJECTIVE: This study investigated the efficacy of a HAPA-based internet-delivered BA intervention (iBA; called InterAKTIV) in individuals with depression, also assessing HAPA-based motivational and volitional outcomes. METHODS: In a two-arm randomized controlled efficacy trial with a parallel design, 128 participants with a major depressive episode were randomly allocated to the intervention group (IG; TAU + immediate access to iBA) or control group (CG; TAU + access to iBA after follow-up). The primary outcome of clinician-rated depressive symptoms and secondary outcomes were assessed at baseline (T1), 8 weeks (T2), 6-month after randomization (T3). Data were analyzed on an intention-to-treat basis. RESULTS: Linear mixed model analyses revealed a significant group*time interaction effect on clinician-rated depressive symptoms favoring the IG (F2, 156.0 = 7.40; p < 0.001, d = 0.79 at T2, d = 0.25 at T3). The IG was also superior regarding self-rated depressive symptoms, BA, most motivational, and all volitional outcomes. CONCLUSION: This study shows that HAPA-based iBA can significantly improve clinician-rated depressive symptoms, as well as outcomes used in the HAPA model in people with depression. Building on these efficacy results, in the next step, the relationship between BA interventions and activity levels should be investigated, taking into account motivation and volition as potential mediators.

Control Beliefs Mediate the Within-Person Relationship Between Everyday Activity Volition and Daily Subjective Age.

OBJECTIVES: Appraisal and interpretation of personal experiences resulting from interaction with situational contexts might play an important role in shaping subjective age at the within-person level, but it is unclear how this process unfolds. We propose that older adults evaluate situational contexts and reflect on their general psychological resources when determining their subjective age, and tested this proposal with volition of daily activities as a proxy for appraisal of situational contexts and control beliefs as a proxy for psychological resources. We hypothesize that appraising daily activities one engaged in as obligatory would deplete one's perceived control and concomitantly make one feel older. METHODS: Older adults (n = 116) ranging in age from 60 to 90 (M = 64.84) completed a 9-day daily diary study online, resulting in 743 total days. Participants reported their sociodemographic characteristics on Day 1 and major daily activities, volition of every reported activity, felt age, and control beliefs on Days 2-9. RESULTS: On days when older adults felt that activities they engaged in were of their own volition, they also felt more in control. A lower-level mediation result suggested that within-person control beliefs mediated the relationship between volition of daily activities and subjective age. DISCUSSION: Our findings suggest that older adults evaluate situational contexts and reflect on their control beliefs as a general psychological resource when determining their subjective age. These findings show the important role psychological resources play in determining subjective age from a within-person perspective and extended the within-person process proposed in previous theoretical models.

Behavioral measurements of motor readiness in mice.

Motor planning facilitates rapid and precise execution of volitional movements. Although motor planning has been classically studied in humans and monkeys, the mouse has become an increasingly popular model system to study neural mechanisms of motor planning. It remains yet untested whether mice and primates share common behavioral features of motor planning. We combined videography and a delayed response task paradigm in an autonomous behavioral system to measure motor planning in non-body-restrained mice. Motor planning resulted in both reaction time (RT) savings and increased movement accuracy, replicating classic effects in primates. We found that motor planning was reflected in task-relevant body features. Both the specific actions prepared and the degree of motor readiness could be read out online during motor planning. The online readout further revealed behavioral evidence of simultaneous preparation for multiple actions under uncertain conditions. These results validate the mouse as a model to study motor planning, demonstrate body feature movements as a powerful real-time readout of motor readiness, and offer behavioral evidence that motor planning can be a parallel process that permits rapid selection of multiple prepared actions.

Implicit bias training can remove bias from subliminal stimuli, restoring choice divergence: A proof-of-concept study.

Subliminal information can influence our conscious life. Subliminal stimuli can influence cognitive tasks, while endogenous subliminal neural information can sway decisions before volition. Are decisions inextricably biased towards subliminal information? Or can they diverge away from subliminal biases via training? We report that implicit bias training can remove biases from subliminal sensory primes. We first show that subliminal stimuli biased an imagery-content decision task. Participants (n = 17) had to choose one of two different patterns to subsequently imagine. Subliminal primes significantly biased decisions towards imagining the primed option. Then, we trained participants (n = 7) to choose the non-primed option, via post choice feedback. This training was successful despite participants being unaware of the purpose or structure of the reward schedule. This implicit bias training persisted up to one week later. Our proof-of-concept study indicates that decisions might not always have to be biased towards non-conscious information, but instead can diverge from subliminal primes through training.

Attention without Constraint: Alpha Lateralization in Uncued Willed Attention.

Studies of voluntary visual spatial attention have used attention-directing cues, such as arrows, to induce or instruct observers to focus selective attention on relevant locations in visual space to detect or discriminate subsequent target stimuli. In everyday vision, however, voluntary attention is influenced by a host of factors, most of which are quite different from the laboratory paradigms that use attention-directing cues. These factors include priming, experience, reward, meaning, motivations, and high-level behavioral goals. Attention that is endogenously directed in the absence of external attention-directing cues has been referred to as "self-initiated attention" or, as in our prior work, as "willed attention" where volunteers decide where to attend in response to a prompt to do so. Here, we used a novel paradigm that eliminated external influences (i.e., attention-directing cues and prompts) about where and/or when spatial attention should be directed. Using machine learning decoding methods, we showed that the well known lateralization of EEG alpha power during spatial attention was also present during purely self-generated attention. By eliminating explicit cues or prompts that affect the allocation of voluntary attention, this work advances our understanding of the neural correlates of attentional control and provides steps toward the development of EEG-based brain-computer interfaces that tap into human intentions.