How does attention affect fmri responses in primary visual cortex?
Best insight from top research papers
Attention has been shown to strongly influence perceptual processing in primary visual cortex (V1) as well as extrastriate visual cortex. Functional MRI studies have demonstrated robust attentional modulations in both V1 and extrastriate cortical areas, indicating that V1 can be strongly and specifically influenced by attention . Furthermore, attentional load at fixation has been found to modulate the earliest component of the visual evoked potential (C1) in V1, with changes observed throughout the first 100 ms post-stimulus . Neuronal contrast response functions in V1 have also shown that attention adds to the neuronal responses in a largely contrast invariant manner, suggesting that feedback from higher areas exerts a constant attentional drive that is mostly task-driven . However, fMRI measurements of attentional modulation in V1 may be delayed relative to other processes, indicating the importance of using fine timing information in fMRI responses .
Answers from top 5 papers
More filters
| Papers (5) | Insight |
|---|---|
| Attention affects fMRI responses in the primary visual cortex by enhancing responses to attended stimuli and suppressing responses when attention is directed elsewhere. | |
| The provided paper does not mention fMRI responses in the primary visual cortex. | |
129 Citations | The paper provides evidence that attentional load affects activity in the primary visual cortex (V1) as measured by EEG, but it does not specifically mention the effects of attention on fMRI responses in V1. |
| The provided paper does not specifically mention fMRI responses in the primary visual cortex. | |
8 Citations | The paper states that fMRI measurements of attentional modulation in primary visual cortex (V1) show large effects, but these effects are delayed by roughly one second in time compared to unattended responses and response increases due to boosting stimulus contrast. |
Related Questions
How does color influence attention?5 answersColor influences attention in various ways. Research indicates that color perception affects emotional processing, with red being linked to threat perception. Moreover, color imagery can guide attention during visual search tasks, as demonstrated by the N2pc component in electrophysiological markers. Additionally, color plays a significant role in triggering and maintaining attention levels, with different colors impacting attention thresholds differently. Furthermore, color information influences eye movement characteristics, such as gaze position and fixation duration, while also increasing the number of regions of interest in visual stimuli. Overall, color can modulate attention by influencing emotional responses, guiding attentional processes, and impacting visual saliency.
How can emotions influence the attentional process?5 answersEmotions can significantly impact the attentional process by influencing various cognitive mechanisms. Emotional stimuli, such as facial expressions, can alter electroencephalographic activities, leading to changes in perceptual processing and activations of attentional networks. Studies suggest that attentional biases towards emotional stimuli, both positive and negative, can affect visual attention performance. Additionally, emotional states, like positive or negative valence, can influence attention fluctuations and task performance. Individuals with high alexithymia may exhibit early avoidance tendencies towards anxiety-evoking stimuli, impacting subsequent attention processing and reaction times. Selectively attending to specific emotions, like happy faces, can enhance early emotional processing, as indicated by changes in event-related potentials.
Which factors influence attention?5 answersFactors that influence attention include parental socioeconomic status (SES) and home environment, gender, school grade, and age.The early environment, such as chaos in the home, and parental occupation have been found to negatively impact attentional performance in infants and boxers.Girls tend to perform better in tests of distractibility and impulsive reaction tendencies, while higher school grade positively influences divided and sustained attention.The online attention to events like the Beijing Olympics and Paralympic Winter Games is influenced by factors such as the Internet penetration rate, per-capita income, and the population base of permanent residents.These findings suggest that attention is influenced by a combination of individual, environmental, and sociodemographic factors.
How does attention affect memory?4 answersAttention plays a crucial role in memory. It filters sensory input, determines what information enters conscious awareness, and influences memory encoding and retrieval. Attention and memory have bidirectional interactions, with attention being informed by goals, episodes, and knowledge held in memory. These interactions are found across different types of memory and their underlying brain systems. Studies have shown that attention is important for memory encoding, and interventions that enhance attention, such as visually guided saccades, can improve memory performance. There are two dissociable aspects of attention that influence memory encoding: sustained attention and prioritization via covert spatial attention. Both aspects have independent effects on long-term memory encoding, and individual differences in attentional control can affect memory performance. Overall, attention plays a fundamental role in the organization and selectivity of memory.
How does increased visual attention influence cognitive processing?5 answersIncreased visual attention has been shown to have profound and pervasive influences on cognitive processing. Neurocomputational models suggest that attention can alter the inputs to cognitive processes and transform the landscape of perception. Studies have demonstrated that cognitive factors, such as selective attention and stimulus predictability, strongly impact the sensory processing of visual information. Attention can enhance the responses of visual neurons and decrease correlations between pairs of neurons, depending on the role of the neurons in the behavioral task. However, the effects of attentional scaling on cognitive processing can vary depending on the neural pathways involved and the methodologies used in the research. Overall, increased visual attention has been found to modulate the sensory processing of visual information and place important constraints on models of cognitive mechanisms.
Is attention part of working memory?5 answersAttention and working memory are distinct but correlated constructs. Working memory capacity is related to attention control, which involves the ability to maintain attention on a task. On the other hand, attention control is related to both working memory and selective attention. Differences in working memory capacity are determined by the ability to maintain attention on the task, while the ability to filter out non-salient distractors is not related to working memory capacity. Attention allows us to selectively enhance processing of specific locations or features in our external environment while filtering out irrelevant information. Recent studies have shown that attention is a rhythmic process, alternating between multiple relevant representations. This rhythmic attentional mechanism is also observed in internal visual working memory representations. Non-spatial retro-cues initiate theta-rhythmic sampling of multi-feature objects in working memory, suggesting that external and internal visual representations are accessed by similar attentional mechanisms. Information can be prioritized automatically in working memory through physical salience, statistical learning, and reward learning. These automatic attentional processes contribute to the relationship between attention and working memory.