Risk-taking behaviour is an essential aspect of our interactions with the environment. Here we investigated whether vestibular inputs influence behavioural measurement risk-taking propensity. We have combined bipolar Galvanic Vestibular Stimulation (GVS) a well-known and established task, namely Balloon Analogue Risk Task (BART). A sham stimulation was used to control for non-specific effects. ...

Percutaneous electrical stimuli (up to 600 V) were applied over the cervical spinal cord to evoke responses in the biceps brachii and thenar muscles. Cathodal stimulation over the C7 spinous process was more effective than anodal stimulation or stimulation over the C5 or C3 spinous process. As the stimulus intensity was increased, the response amplitude increased and the latency decreased. When...

The aim of the present study was to test whether transcranial electrical stimulation can modulate illusory perception in the auditory domain. In two separate experiments we applied transcranial Direct Current Stimulation (anodal/cathodal tDCS, 2 mA; N = 60) and high-frequency transcranial Random Noise Stimulation (hf-tRNS, 1.5 mA, offset 0; N = 45) on the temporal cortex during the presentation...

Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) over the opercular somatosensory region (OP), which includes the secondary somatosensory cortex and the insular cortex, suppresses pain sensation. However, whether transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) over the OP has a similar effect on pain sensation remains unknown. We examined whether pain sensation would be suppressed by tDCS over the OP. Ou...

Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) is a noninvasive brain stimulation technique that induces changes in cortical excitability: anodal stimulation increases while cathodal stimulation reduces excitability. Imaging studies performed after unilateral stimulation have shown conflicting results regarding the effects of tDCS on surrogate markers of neuronal activity. The aim of this study...

We investigated the contributions of the cerebellum and the motor cortex (M1) to acquisition and retention of human motor memories in a force field reaching task. We found that anodal transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) of the cerebellum, a technique that is thought to increase neuronal excitability, increased the ability to learn from error and form an internal model of the field, w...

Creative cognition is frequently described as involving two primary processes, idea generation and idea selection. A growing body of research has used transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) to examine the neural mechanisms implicated in each of these processes. This literature has yielded a diverse set of findings that vary depending on the location and type (anodal, cathodal, or both) ...

The treatment of writer's cramp, a task-specific focal hand dystonia, needs new approaches. A deficiency of inhibition in the motor cortex might cause writer's cramp. Transcranial direct current stimulation modulates cortical excitability and may provide a therapeutic alternative. In this randomized, double-blind, sham-controlled study, we investigated the efficacy of cathodal stimulation of th...

A role for the cerebellum in cognition is controversial, but it is a view that is becoming increasingly popular. The aim of the current study was to investigate this issue using transcranial Direct Current Stimulation (tDCS) during two cognitive tasks that require comparable motor skills, but different levels of working memory and attention. Three groups of twenty-two participants each performe...

Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) effectively modulates cortical excitability. Several studies suggest clinical efficacy in chronic pain syndromes. However, little is known regarding its effects on cortical pain processing. In this double-blind, randomized, cross-over, sham controlled study, we examined the effects of anodal, cathodal, and sham stimulation of the left motor cortex ...