Magnetic stimulation of the brain improved awareness of subject's own cognitive abilities
By combining different brain research methods in a versatile manner the researchers showed for the first time that transcranial magnetic stimulation of the brain targeting the prefrontal cortex can improve a test subject's ability to evaluate his or her performance in a tactile working memory task. The ability of human subjects to monitor and control their own cognitive processes is called metacognition. Metacognition is important for people and in many neuropsychiatric illnesses, it is possible to recognize that it has weakened. 'The patient's reduced sense of being ill is familiar from conditions such as Alzheimer's disease, schizophrenia, and traumatic brain injury. Understanding the brain function of healthy test subjects could help in the development of new treatment methods for neuropsychiatric illnesses in the future,' says Doctoral Candidate Juha Gogulski. Safe method Transcranial magnetic stimulation refers to a method in which the nerve cells o...