A Method of Developing Video Stimuli that Are Amenable to Neuroimaging Analysis: An EEG Pilot Study.

Creation of streaming video stimuli that allow for strict experimental control while providing ease of scene manipulation is difficult to achieve but desired by researchers seeking to approach ecological validity in contexts that involve processing streaming visual information. To that end, we propose leveraging video game modding tools as a method of creating research quality stimuli. As a pilot effort, we used a video game sandbox tool (Garry's Mod) to create three steaming video scenarios designed to mimic video feeds that physical security personnel might observe. All scenarios required participants to identify the presences of a threat appearing during the video feed. Each scenario differed in level of complexity, in that one scenario required only location monitoring, one required location and action monitoring, and one required location, action, and conjunction monitoring in that when an action was performed it was only considered a threat when performed by a certain character model. While there was no behavioral effect of scenario in terms of accuracy or response times, in all scenarios we found evidence of a P300 when comparing response to threatening stimuli to that of standard stimuli. Results therefore indicate that sufficient levels of experimental control may be achieved to allow for the precise timing required for ERP analysis. Thus, we demonstrate the feasibility of using existing modding tools to create video scenarios amenable to neuroimaging analysis.