Future-oriented cognition: identifying cognitive and neural mechanisms in healthy and pathological populations

Future-oriented cognition is of great consequence in our daily lives, as it enables individuals to plan actions, anticipate future events, and navigate complex decision-making processes. The present PhD project investigated the cognitive and neural processes that underpin future-oriented cognition, encompassing episodic future thinking, prospective memory (PM), and temporal discounting across both healthy and pathological populations. The first study employing a meta-analytic methodology demonstrated that future-oriented cognition is not confined to a singular neural region or network. Instead, the representation of the future was observed to exhibit a gradient along the anterior-posterior axis, which was influenced by the level of abstractness or concreteness of the simulated scenarios. Two distinct neural networks were identified: the Default Network, which was primarily engaged in future thinking, and the Salience Network, which supported prospective memory and delay discounting. The second study addressed the limitations of traditional laboratory settings by investigating neural correlates of PM in a more ecologically valid context with healthy young adults. Participants were engaged in a naturalistic task, which involved watching a movie while simultaneously managing everyday intentions, such as virtual cooking. The study employed high-density electroencephalography (hd-EEG) to capture brain oscillatory activity, revealing that the time-based PM task was characterized by widespread fronto-temporal activation in the theta, alpha, and beta frequency bands. The specific presence of beta oscillations in time-based PM highlighted their specific role in strategic monitoring of time intervals. In contrast, the event-based PM condition was associated with localized theta and alpha oscillations in occipito-parietal regions. The third study examined age-related differences in PM processes by analyzing neural oscillations in younger and older adults during time-based and event-based PM tasks. Behavioral findings indicated that older adults exhibit significantly lower accuracy in time-based PM tasks, and EEG analyses revealed notable neural differences. In particular, older adults exhibited higher theta and beta power across posterior regions, indicating an increase cognitive effort in maintaining future intentions. This study contributed to the understanding of the age-PM paradox, elucidating the way older adults encounter difficulties in self-initiated monitoring and intention retrieval while employing adaptive strategies to cope with the cognitive demands placed upon them. The fourth study examined PM performance in individuals with Parkinson's disease (PD) using hd-EEG to investigate the neural correlates of PM tasks in naturalistic settings. Although the findings showed no significant differences in accuracy or response times between PD patients without mild cognitive impairment (MCI) and healthy controls, EEG power analyses revealed increased theta, alpha, and beta activity in central and frontal regions during event- and time- based PM tasks in PD patients. This increased neural activity might be indicative of a compensatory mechanism, whereby the recruitment of higher cognitive resources has resulted in enhanced behavioral outcomes. These results emphasized the need for further investigation into the neural mechanisms of PM in PD, which might facilitate the identification of early biomarkers of cognitive impairments. In summary, the present thesis advanced the understanding of future-oriented cognition by integrating behavioral and neurophysiological perspectives, emphasizing the significance of ecological paradigms.