Resting Parietal Electroencephalogram Asymmetries and Self-Reported Attentional Control

Research on electroencephalogram (EEG) asymmetries and anxiety proneness has recently spread to emotion regulation capabilities. We studied whether attentional control (AC), a temperamental construct related to emotional regulation, was associated with asymmetrical patterns of resting EEG activity at the frontal and parietal regions, reflected not only in the a frequency band (8-13 Hz) but also in higher bands beta 1 (13-20 Hz) and beta 2 (20-30 Hz). Self-reports of AC and trait anxiety, and resting EEG recordings, were obtained from 58 healthy participants. Correlational analysis showed that lower levels of self-reported AC were associated with less alpha, beta 1, and beta 2 powers in the left parietal cortex, while no significant relationships were found between the AC and EEG oscillations in the prefrontal cortex. The role of the left and right parietal lobes in the attentional processes is discussed.