ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Hum. Neurosci.
Sec. Cognitive Neuroscience
Volume 19 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fnhum.2025.1464617
The Impact of Interactive Motor-Cognitive Dual Tasking on Brain Activation, Functional Connectivity, and Behavioral Performance in Healthy Adults: An fNIRS Study
Provisionally accepted
- 1Ningbo Rehabilitation Hospital, Ningbo, China
- 2Gannan Medical University, Ganzhou, Jiangxi Province, China
- 3Ningbo University, Ningbo, Zhejiang Province, China
- 4Ningbo College of Health Sciences, Ningbo, China
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Objective: This study aimed to explore how varying levels of interactive motor-cognitive dual task difficulty affect brain activation, functional connectivity (FC), and behavioral performance in healthy adults using functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS).Methods: We recruited 28 healthy participants to perform interactive motor-cognitive dual task at three difficulty levels: easy task (ET), medium task (MT), and difficult task (DT). The tasks involved walking while simultaneously engaging in cognitive challenges. A continuous-wave fNIRS system was used to collect fNIRS data during the task, focusing on 10 regions of interest (ROIs): left/right prefrontal cortex (LPFC/RPFC), left/right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC/DRPFC), left/right premotor cortex (LPMC/RPMC), left/right sensorimotor cortex (LSC/RSC), and left/right motor cortex (LMC/RMC). Simultaneously, the subjects' gait data during walking were collected using an Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU) sensor, and their cognitive performance was recorded by the researchers.Results: Statistical analysis revealed statistically significant differences in the mean HbO levels among the three groups for the DRPFC, LPMC/RPMC, RSC, and LMC/RMC regions. Additionally, significant differences were found in the activation of channels 3, 18, 24, 25, 28, and 29 across the three groups. The group-averaged FC in the DT (0.61±0.21) was significantly higher than that in the ET (0.46±0.21, P=0.023). ROI-to-ROI FC analysis showed significant differences among the three groups in the LSC~RPMC, RPMC~RSC, and RSC~RMC connections. The lateralization index (LI) ranged from 0.10 to 0.35, indicating a predominant right-brain lateralization during the interactive motor-cognitive dual task. Additionally, compared to the MT, both speed and stride length, as well as cognitive performance, were lower during the DT.Conclusions: We found that increased task difficulty heightened activation in the premotor and motor cortices, with a tendency toward right hemisphere dominance. Higher task difficulty also strengthened FC, particularly in motor-related regions, indicating greater neural coordination. Behaviorally, participants exhibited slower gait parameters and reduced cognitive performance as task complexity increased, highlighting the impact of dual-task interference.
Keywords: fNIRS, interactive dual task, brain activation, functional connectivity, lateralization
Received: 14 Jul 2024; Accepted: 02 Jun 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Li, Tang, Zhang, Ye, Zhou and Tang. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Min Tang, Ningbo Rehabilitation Hospital, Ningbo, China
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