Unlock the Secrets of Ageing Brains Through P300 Brain-computer Interface Games

MoCA (Montreal Cognitive Assessment or The MoCA Test) was validated as a highly sensitive tool for early detection of mild cognitive impairment (MCI) in hundreds of peer-reviewed studies since 2000. MoCA has been widely adopted in clinical settings and used in academic and non-academic research around the world. The sensitivity of MoCA for detecting MCI is 90%, compared to 18% for the MMSE. Prospective participants meeting the eligibility criteria, as determined by the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) test, will be invited to the Brain- Computer Interface (BCI) laboratory at the Kroto Research Centre on the University of Sheffield north campus to participate in the study.

Random Dot Motion task (RDM) has been widely used in research on spatial attention, and decision-making ability, etc., and its results (accuracy and reaction time) can be used as indicators to detect spatial attention. During the assessment, participants were required to monitor a series of dots in constant random motion on the screen. The dots sometimes moved coherently together to the left or right, and participants were required to press the left mouse button when they perceived them moving to the left and the right mouse button when they observed them moving to the right. We are going to use the motion coherence level of 50%. The higher the coherence level, the greater the number of dots moving together, and the combination of the moving direction and coherence level of the dots appear randomly during the task.

Two different speller matrix sizes: 3×3 and 5×5, two inter-stimulus intervals (ISIs): 117ms (i.e., commonly used ISI for healthy adults) and 175ms (i.e., 50% longer than the widely used ISI) and two spelling words (QUICK and JUMP) are designed in this experiment to explore the calibration accuracy of these eight parameter combinations in the young and old groups and obtain the best parameter combination. The matrix contains letters and digits, and the target letters will be displayed below the matrix letter by letter. When the speller runs, the rows and columns in the matrix will flash 15 times each randomly. Each flash will last for 55ms, and the subsequent ISI will last for different times according to different parameter designs. Participants only need to focus on the target letter and silently count the number it flashes, as flashing target letters can generate P300 if well attended.