abstract Julie Duqué

Julie Duqué (Institute of Neuroscience, Université Catholique de Louvain, Belgium)

Mechanisms of inhibition for action

Top-down control processes are critical to select goal-directed actions in flexible environments. In humans, these processes include two inhibitory mechanisms that operate during response selection. One decreases the activation of selected responses at the spinal level, helping to control when selected movements should be initiated by preventing their premature release; a second, upstream mechanism helps to determine what response to make during a competitive selection process. In my talk, I will focus on several studies which allowed providing evidence for these two forms of inhibition using transcranial magnetic stimulation. In addition, I will present some preliminary work suggesting that these mechanisms might be affected in alcohol-dependent patients.