RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Pain Processing Is Faster than Tactile Processing in the Human Brain
JF The Journal of Neuroscience
JO J. Neurosci.
FD Society for Neuroscience
SP 10879
OP 10882
DO 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.2386-06.2006
VO 26
IS 42
A1 Ploner, Markus
A1 Gross, Joachim
A1 Timmermann, Lars
A1 Schnitzler, Alfons
YR 2006
UL http://www.jneurosci.org/content/26/42/10879.abstract
AB Pain signals threat and drives the individual into a behavioral response that significantly depends on a short stimulus-response latency. Paradoxically, the peripheral and spinal conduction velocities of pain are much slower than of tactile information. However, cerebral processing times and reaction times of touch and pain have not yet been fully assessed. Here we show that reaction times to selective nociceptive cutaneous laser stimuli are substantially faster than expected from the peripheral conduction velocities. Furthermore, by using magnetoencephalography, we found that latencies between earliest stimulus-evoked cortical responses and reaction times are ∼60 ms shorter for nociceptive than for tactile stimuli. These findings reveal that cerebral processing of pain is substantially faster than processing of tactile information and relatively compensates for the slow peripheral and spinal conduction velocities of pain. Our observation shows how the cerebral organization of pain processing enhances motor responses to potentially harmful stimuli and thereby subserves the particular behavioral demands of pain.