EEG activities and connectivities associated with surtitle presentation during live opera viewing: an exploratory analysis of cognitive absorption

Characterizing brain activities underlying text availability in an ecologically valid context and identifying whether aspects of these activities are influenced by one's state of cognitive absorption (CA) are important yet unexplored lines of research in cognitive neuroscience. This study investigated the oculometric behavior and electroencephalographic (EEG) activities during periods with vs. without surtitle presentation in 25 human subjects while they viewed a live theatrical stage performance, and further explored relationships with self-reported CA. Behaviorally, subjects anticipated the appearance of text, and oriented their gaze toward them when they were present regardless of their level of CA . Neurophysiologically, text presence/absence was differentiated primarily by EEG theta activities and beta connectivities in or between visuospatial processing areas. Importantly, text presence-associated increases in theta activity in the frontal eye field and beta connectivity between the precuneus and the primary visual cortex did not significantly vary with self-reported CA, suggesting that these processes may support the automatic allocation of attention to available text.