The Impact of Motivation on Sustained Attention in Very Preterm and Term-born Children: An ERP Study.

ABSTRACT:

Objective

To compare the effect of motivational features on sustained attention in children born very preterm and at term.

Method

EEG was recorded while 34 8-to-11-year-old children born very preterm and 34 term-born peers completed two variants of a cued continuous performance task (CPT-AX); a standard CPT-AX with basic shape stimuli, and structurally similar motivating variant, with a storyline, familiar characters, and feedback.

Results

Higher hit rates, quicker response times and larger event-related potential (ERP) amplitudes were observed during the motivating, compared with the standard, task. Although groups did not differ in task performance, between-task differences in ERPs associated with orienting were larger in term-born than very preterm children.

SUBMITTER: Retzler J 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11956374 | biostudies-literature | 2025 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature