Where in the brain does visual attention select the forest and the trees?

Details

Serval ID
serval:BIB_1114453E3B04
Type
Article: article from journal or magazin.
Collection
Publications
Title
Where in the brain does visual attention select the forest and the trees?
Journal
Nature
Author(s)
Fink G.R., Halligan P.W., Marshall J.C., Frith C.D., Frackowiak R.S., Dolan R.J.
ISSN
0028-0836 (Print)
ISSN-L
0028-0836
Publication state
Published
Issued date
1996
Volume
382
Number
6592
Pages
626-628
Language
english
Notes
Publication types: Journal Article ; Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov'tPublication Status: ppublish
Abstract
The perceptual world is organized hierarchically: the forest consists of trees, which in turn have leaves. Visual attention can emphasize the overall picture (global form) or the focal details of a scene (local components). Neuropsychological studies have indicated that the left hemisphere is biased towards local and the right towards global processing. The underlying attentional and perceptual mechanisms are maximally impaired by unilateral lesions to the temporal and parietal cortex. We measured brain activity of normal subjects during two experiments using 'hierarchically' organized figures. In a directed attention task, early visual processing (prestriate) areas were activated: attention to the global aspect of the figures activated the right lingual gyrus whereas locally directed attention activated the left inferior occipital cortex. In a subsequent divided attention task, the number of target switches from local to global (and vice versa) covaried with temporal-parietal activation. The findings provide direct evidence for hemispheric specialization in global and local perception; furthermore, they indicate that temporal-parietal areas exert attentional control over the neural transformations occurring in prestriate cortex.
Keywords
Attention/physiology, Brain Mapping, Cerebral Cortex/physiology, Cerebrovascular Circulation, Dominance, Cerebral, Humans, Male, Visual Cortex/physiology, Visual Perception/physiology
Pubmed
Web of science
Create date
16/09/2011 18:36
Last modification date
20/08/2019 12:38
Usage data