From Accelerometer to Cognition: Hand Motion Can Reflect Effects of Cardiac Coherence on Cognitive Flexibility

Hand displacements during task-directed movements are not random, but exhibit fractal behavior. Wearable sensing e.g., accelerometer-derived hand movement fluctuations, could add a significant contribution to cognitive and behavioral sciences, by accounting for fractal dynamics. In particular, multifractal testing of fluctuation time series has been shown to reflect the adaptive use of cognition, i.e., cognitive flexibility. This important property might be enhanced by an improved mental state. Here, an experimental group (16 participants, 3 females) practiced 5 min cardiac coherence (CC) prior to a cognitive flexibility task and was compared to a control group (13 participants, 4 females). Accelerometer-derived hand motion was analyzed using multifractal-multiscale detrended fluctuation analysis (MFMS-DFA) during a task involving cognitive flexibility, the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test (WCST). WCST included four phases alternating the use of cards with original shapes or animal pictures developed for children in previous research. Hand behavioral time series derived from the wearable accelerometer effectively exhibited nonlinear multifractality as shown using linearized surrogates testing. Multifractal-multiscale metrics revealed significant effects of pre-task CC practice, specifically during WCST shape condition where CC participants showed lower multifractal degree despite similar performances (perseverative errors). We conclude that multifractal-multiscale testing of accelerometer-derived hand motion could make a significant contribution to interpreting changes in cognitive flexibility.