title: The independent influence of concussive and sub-concussive impacts on soccer players' neurophysiological and neuropsychological function.
abstract: Accumulating research demonstrates that repetitive sub-concussive impacts can alter the structure, function and connectivity of the brain. However, the functional significance of these alterations as well as the independent contribution of concussive and sub-concussive impacts to neurophysiological and neuropsychological health are unclear. Accordingly, we compared the neurophysiological and neuropsychological function of contact athletes with (concussion group) and without (sub-concussion group) a history of concussion, to non-contact athletes. We evaluated event-related brain potentials (ERPs) elicited during an oddball task and performance on a targeted battery of neuropsychological tasks. Athletes in the sub-concussion and concussion groups exhibited similar amplitude reductions in the ERP indices of attentional resource allocation (P3b) and attentional orienting (P3a) relative to non-contact athletes. However, only athletes in the concussion group exhibited reduced amplitude in the ERP index of perceptual attention (N1). Athletes in the sub-concussion and concussion groups also exhibited deficits in memory recall relative to non-contact athletes, but athletes in the concussion group also exhibited significantly more recall errors than athletes in the sub-concussion group. Additionally, only athletes in the concussion group exhibited response delays during the oddball task. The current findings suggest that sub-concussive impacts are associated with alterations in the neurophysiological and neuropsychological indices of essential cognitive functions, albeit to a lesser degree than the combination of sub-concussive and concussive impacts.
authors.affiliation: University of South Carolina, Arnold School of Public Health, 921 Assembly Street, Columbia, SC 29201, USA. Electronic address: moorerd3@mailbox.sc.edu.
authors.forename: R Davis
authors.initials: RD
authors.lastname: Moore
authors.affiliation: Université de Montréal, Départment de Kinésiologie, 100 boul. Édouard-Montpetit, Montréal, Québec H3T 1J4, Canada. Electronic address: julien.lepine@umontreal.ca.
authors.forename: Julien
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Lepine
authors.affiliation: Université de Montréal, Départment de Kinésiologie, 100 boul. Édouard-Montpetit, Montréal, Québec H3T 1J4, Canada. Electronic address: dave.ellemberg@umontreal.ca.
authors.forename: Dave
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Ellemberg
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001265:Athletic Injuries / Q000503:physiopathology*; D001924:Brain Concussion / Q000503:physiopathology*; D004569:Electroencephalography; D018913:Event-Related Potentials, P300 / Q000502:physiology; D005071:Evoked Potentials / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D012916:Soccer / Q000502:physiology*; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Concussion; ERPs; Neurophysiology; Neuropsychology; Sub-concussion