Does the breathing cycle modulate the orientation of our attention?

(In-Person) Poster Presentation

At any point in time, individuals either orient themselves to the outside world, or rely on their internal representations (i.e., memories) to guide behavior and actions. We investigated to what degree the respiratory cycle modulates spontaneous exploration of the environment. Specifically, we tested the hypothesis that the tendency to direct attention to an external cue for information is increased during inhalation and decreased during exhalation. Our research utilized a novel task-switching paradigm that assesses how participants decide between internal and external representations to guide action. Employing eye-tracking, we tracked when people turn to the environment for information while registering respiration using a chest belt. Contrary to the hypothesis, we found that participants tend to orient their attention internally during inhalation and are more likely to check external cues during exhalation. These findings are discussed using evidence from neuroscience into account. To our knowledge, this experiment is the first to examine the relationship between breathing and attentional shifts between internal and external stimuli. Our results demonstrate the coupling of higher-level cognitive functions with lower-level physiological oscillatory signals that are often considered noise. They also pave the way for the examination of the kind of breathing/cognition interactions that are often assumed in the context of meditative practices.