Prestimulus hemodynamic activity in dorsal attention network is negatively associated with decision confidence in visual perception

2012 ◽  
Vol 108 (5) ◽  
pp. 1529-1536 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dobromir A. Rahnev ◽  
Linda Bahdo ◽  
Floris P. de Lange ◽  
Hakwan Lau

Attention is thought to improve most aspects of perception. However, we recently showed that, somewhat surprisingly, endogenous attention can also lead to low subjective perceptual ratings ( Rahnev et al., 2011 ). Here we investigated the neural basis of this effect and tested whether spontaneous fluctuations of the attentional state can lead to low confidence in one's perceptual decision. We measured prestimulus functional magnetic resonance imaging activity in the dorsal attention network and used that activity as an index of the level of attention involved in a motion direction discrimination task. Extending our previous findings, we showed that low prestimulus activity in the dorsal attention network, which presumably reflected low level of attention, was associated with higher confidence ratings. These results were explained by a signal detection theoretic model in which lack of attention increases the trial-by-trial variability of the internal perceptual response. In line with the model, we also found that low prestimulus activity in the dorsal attention network was associated with higher trial-by-trial variability of poststimulus peak activity in the motion-sensitive region MT+. These findings support the notion that lack of attention may lead to liberal subjective perceptual biases, a phenomenon we call “inattentional inflation of subjective perception.”

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ryan M. Barker ◽  
Marie St-Laurent ◽  
Bradley R. Buchsbaum

AbstractEpisodic recollections vary in fidelity, sharpness, and strength—qualities that can be examined using both introspective judgements of mental states and objective measures of brain activity. Subjective and objective measures are both valid ways of “reading out” the content of someone’s internal mnemonic states, each with different strengths and weaknesses. St-Laurent and colleagues (2015) investigated the neural correlates of memory vividness ratings and neural reactivation during memory recall and found considerable overlap, suggesting common neural basis underlying these different markers of successful recollection. Here we extended this work with a much more extensive examination in which we used meta-analytic methods to pool four neuroimaging datasets in order to compare and contrast the neural substrates of neural reactivation and vividness judgements. While reactivation and vividness judgements correlated positively with one another and were associated with common univariate activity in the dorsal attention network and anterior hippocampus, some differences were also observed. Vividness judgments were tied to stronger activation in the striatum and dorsal attention network, together with suppression of default mode network nodes, and we also observed a trend for reactivation to be more closely associated with early visual cortex activity. A mediation analysis found support for the hypothesis that neural reactivation is necessary for vivid recollection, with activity in the anterior hippocampus associated with greater reactivation. Our results suggest that neural reactivation and vividness judgements reflect common recollective processing but differ in the extent to which they engage effortful, attentional processing. Additionally, the similarity between reactivation and vividness appears to arise, partly, through hippocampal processing during recollection.


Author(s):  
Filippo Ghin ◽  
Louise O’Hare ◽  
Andrea Pavan

AbstractThere is evidence that high-frequency transcranial random noise stimulation (hf-tRNS) is effective in improving behavioural performance in several visual tasks. However, so far there has been limited research into the spatial and temporal characteristics of hf-tRNS-induced facilitatory effects. In the present study, electroencephalogram (EEG) was used to investigate the spatial and temporal dynamics of cortical activity modulated by offline hf-tRNS on performance on a motion direction discrimination task. We used EEG to measure the amplitude of motion-related VEPs over the parieto-occipital cortex, as well as oscillatory power spectral density (PSD) at rest. A time–frequency decomposition analysis was also performed to investigate the shift in event-related spectral perturbation (ERSP) in response to the motion stimuli between the pre- and post-stimulation period. The results showed that the accuracy of the motion direction discrimination task was not modulated by offline hf-tRNS. Although the motion task was able to elicit motion-dependent VEP components (P1, N2, and P2), none of them showed any significant change between pre- and post-stimulation. We also found a time-dependent increase of the PSD in alpha and beta bands regardless of the stimulation protocol. Finally, time–frequency analysis showed a modulation of ERSP power in the hf-tRNS condition for gamma activity when compared to pre-stimulation periods and Sham stimulation. Overall, these results show that offline hf-tRNS may induce moderate aftereffects in brain oscillatory activity.


2021 ◽  
Vol 226 (4) ◽  
pp. 989-1006
Author(s):  
Ilenia Salsano ◽  
Valerio Santangelo ◽  
Emiliano Macaluso

AbstractPrevious studies demonstrated that long-term memory related to object-position in natural scenes guides visuo-spatial attention during subsequent search. Memory-guided attention has been associated with the activation of memory regions (the medial-temporal cortex) and with the fronto-parietal attention network. Notably, these circuits represent external locations with different frames of reference: egocentric (i.e., eyes/head-centered) in the dorsal attention network vs. allocentric (i.e., world/scene-centered) in the medial temporal cortex. Here we used behavioral measures and fMRI to assess the contribution of egocentric and allocentric spatial information during memory-guided attention. At encoding, participants were presented with real-world scenes and asked to search for and memorize the location of a high-contrast target superimposed in half of the scenes. At retrieval, participants viewed again the same scenes, now all including a low-contrast target. In scenes that included the target at encoding, the target was presented at the same scene-location. Critically, scenes were now shown either from the same or different viewpoint compared with encoding. This resulted in a memory-by-view design (target seen/unseen x same/different view), which allowed us teasing apart the role of allocentric vs. egocentric signals during memory-guided attention. Retrieval-related results showed greater search-accuracy for seen than unseen targets, both in the same and different views, indicating that memory contributes to visual search notwithstanding perspective changes. This view-change independent effect was associated with the activation of the left lateral intra-parietal sulcus. Our results demonstrate that this parietal region mediates memory-guided attention by taking into account allocentric/scene-centered information about the objects' position in the external world.


Hypertension ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 76 (5) ◽  
pp. 1480-1490 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lorenzo Carnevale ◽  
Angelo Maffei ◽  
Alessandro Landolfi ◽  
Giovanni Grillea ◽  
Daniela Carnevale ◽  
...  

Hypertension is one of the main risk factors for vascular dementia and Alzheimer disease. To predict the onset of these diseases, it is necessary to develop tools to detect the early effects of vascular risk factors on the brain. Resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging can investigate how the brain modulates its resting activity and analyze how hypertension impacts cerebral function. Here, we used resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging to explore brain functional-hemodynamic coupling across different regions and their connectivity in patients with hypertension, as compared to subjects with normotension. In addition, we leveraged multimodal imaging to identify the signature of hypertension injury on the brain. Our study included 37 subjects (18 normotensives and 19 hypertensives), characterized by microstructural integrity by diffusion tensor imaging and cognitive profile, who were subjected to resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging analysis. We mapped brain functional connectivity networks and evaluated the connectivity differences among regions, identifying the altered connections in patients with hypertension compared with subjects with normotension in the (1) dorsal attention network and sensorimotor network; (2) dorsal attention network and visual network; (3) dorsal attention network and frontoparietal network. Then we tested how diffusion tensor imaging fractional anisotropy of superior longitudinal fasciculus correlates with the connections between dorsal attention network and default mode network and Montreal Cognitive Assessment scores with a widespread network of functional connections. Finally, based on our correlation analysis, we applied a feature selection to highlight those most relevant to describing brain injury in patients with hypertension. Our multimodal imaging data showed that hypertensive brains present a network of functional connectivity alterations that correlate with cognitive dysfunction and microstructural integrity. Registration— URL: https://www.clinicaltrials.gov ; Unique identifier: NCT02310217.


2008 ◽  
Vol 99 (5) ◽  
pp. 2558-2576
Author(s):  
Mario Ruiz-Ruiz ◽  
Julio C. Martinez-Trujillo

Previous studies have demonstrated that human subjects update the location of visual targets for saccades after head and body movements and in the absence of visual feedback. This phenomenon is known as spatial updating. Here we investigated whether a similar mechanism exists for the perception of motion direction. We recorded eye positions in three dimensions and behavioral responses in seven subjects during a motion task in two different conditions: when the subject's head remained stationary and when subjects rotated their heads around an anteroposterior axis (head tilt). We demonstrated that after head-tilt subjects updated the direction of saccades made in the perceived stimulus direction (direction of motion updating), the amount of updating varied across subjects and stimulus directions, the amount of motion direction updating was highly correlated with the amount of spatial updating during a memory-guided saccade task, subjects updated the stimulus direction during a two-alternative forced-choice direction discrimination task in the absence of saccadic eye movements (perceptual updating), perceptual updating was more accurate than motion direction updating involving saccades, and subjects updated motion direction similarly during active and passive head rotation. These results demonstrate the existence of an updating mechanism for the perception of motion direction in the human brain that operates during active and passive head rotations and that resembles the one of spatial updating. Such a mechanism operates during different tasks involving different motor and perceptual skills (saccade and motion direction discrimination) with different degrees of accuracy.


2020 ◽  
Vol 111 ◽  
pp. 107278
Author(s):  
Sangyu Zhou ◽  
Pingan Xiong ◽  
Hongwei Ren ◽  
Wei Tan ◽  
Yanguo Yan ◽  
...  

2020 ◽  
Vol 6 (11) ◽  
pp. eaaz0087 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zirui Huang ◽  
Jun Zhang ◽  
Jinsong Wu ◽  
George A. Mashour ◽  
Anthony G. Hudetz

The ongoing stream of human consciousness relies on two distinct cortical systems, the default mode network and the dorsal attention network, which alternate their activity in an anticorrelated manner. We examined how the two systems are regulated in the conscious brain and how they are disrupted when consciousness is diminished. We provide evidence for a “temporal circuit” characterized by a set of trajectories along which dynamic brain activity occurs. We demonstrate that the transitions between default mode and dorsal attention networks are embedded in this temporal circuit, in which a balanced reciprocal accessibility of brain states is characteristic of consciousness. Conversely, isolation of the default mode and dorsal attention networks from the temporal circuit is associated with unresponsiveness of diverse etiologies. These findings advance the foundational understanding of the functional role of anticorrelated systems in consciousness.


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