Software Bug Detection Causes a Shift From Bottom-Up to Top-Down Effective Connectivity Involving the Insula Within the Error-Monitoring Network

• Autor(a) principal: Castelhano, João
• Data de Publicação: 2022
• Outros Autores: Duarte, Isabel C., Couceiro, Ricardo, Medeiros, Júlio, Durães, João, Afonso, Sónia, Madeira, Henrique, Castelo Branco, Miguel
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositórios Científicos de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (RCAAP)
• Texto Completo: https://hdl.handle.net/10316/103251; https://doi.org/10.3389/fnhum.2022.788272
• topic: computer science; connectivity; error-monitoring; fMRI; insula

The neural correlates of software programming skills have been the target of an increasing number of studies in the past few years. Those studies focused on error-monitoring during software code inspection. Others have studied task-related cognitive load as measured by distinct neurophysiological measures. Most studies addressed only syntax errors (shallow level of code monitoring). However, a recent functional MRI (fMRI) study suggested a pivotal role of the insula during error-monitoring when challenging deep-level analysis of code inspection was required. This raised the hypothesis that the insula is causally involved in deep error-monitoring. To confirm this hypothesis, we carried out a new fMRI study where participants performed a deep source-code comprehension task that included error-monitoring to detect bugs in the code. The generality of our paradigm was enhanced by comparison with a variety of tasks related to text reading and bugless source-code understanding. Healthy adult programmers (N = 21) participated in this 3T fMRI experiment. The activation maps evoked by error-related events confirmed significant activations in the insula [p(Bonferroni) < 0.05]. Importantly, a posterior-to-anterior causality shift was observed concerning the role of the insula: in the absence of error, causal directions were mainly bottom-up, whereas, in their presence, the strong causal top-down effects from frontal regions, in particular, the anterior cingulate cortex was observed.