- Title
- Blinding is compromised for transcranial direct current stimulation at 1 mA for 20 min in young healthy adults
- Creator
- Turi, Zsolt; Csifcsák, Gábor; Thielscher, Axel; Mittner, Matthias; Boayue, Nya Mehnwolo; Aslaksen, Per; Antal, Andrea; Paulus, Walter; Groot, Josephine; Hawkins, Guy E.; Forstmann, Birte; Opitz, Alexander
- Relation
- European Journal of Neuroscience Vol. 50, Issue 8, p. 3261-3268
- Publisher Link
- http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/ejn.14403
- Publisher
- Wiley-Blackwell
- Resource Type
- journal article
- Date
- 2019
- Description
- Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) is a non-invasive brain stimulation method that is frequently used to study cortical excitability changes and their impact on cognitive functions in humans. While most stimulators are capable of operating in double-blind mode, the amount of discomfort experienced during tDCS may break blinding. Therefore, specifically designed sham stimulation protocols are being used. The "fade-in, short-stimulation, fade-out" (FSF) protocol has been used in hundreds of studies and is commonly believed to be indistinguishable from real stimulation applied at 1 mA for 20 min. We analysed subjective reports of 192 volunteers, who either received real tDCS (n=96) or FSF tDCS (n=96). Participants reported more discomfort for real tDCS and correctly guessed the condition above chance-level. These findings indicate that FSF does not ensure complete blinding and that better active sham protocols are needed.
- Subject
- active sham tDCS; blinding; double-blinding; placebo; transcranial; direct current stimulation
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/1959.13/1418464
- Identifier
- uon:37353
- Identifier
- ISSN:0953-816X
- Language
- eng
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