Spatial attention can be biased towards an expected dimension

A commonly held view in both exogenous and endogenous orienting is that spatial attention is associated with enhanced processing of all stimuli at the attended location. However, we often search for a specific target at a particular location, so an observer should be able to jointly specify the target identity and expected location. Whether attention can bias dimension-specific processes at a particular location is not yet clear. We used a dual task to examine the effects of endogenous spatial cues on the accuracy of perceptual judgments of different dimensions. Participants responded to a motion target and a colour target, presented at the same or different locations. We manipulated a central cue to predict the location of the motion or colour target. While overall performance in the two tasks was comparable, cueing effects were larger for the target whose location was predicted by the cue, implying that when attending a particular location, processing of the likely dimension was preferentially enhanced. Additionally, an asymmetry between the motion and colour tasks was seen; motion was modulated by attention, and colour was not. We conclude that attention has some ability to select a dimension at a particular location, indicating integration of spatial and feature-based attention. </jats:p

‘Just can’t hide it’:A behavioral and lesion study on emotional response modulation after right prefrontal damage

Introduction: Historically, emotion regulation problems have been reported as a common consequence of right prefrontal cortex (rPFC) damage. It has been proposed that the rPFC, particularly the rIFG, has a key role inhibiting prepotent reflexive actions, thus contributing to emotion regulation and self-regulation. This study is the first to directly explore this hypothesis, by testing whether damage to the rIFG compromises the voluntary modulation of emotional responses, and whether performance on inhibition tasks is associated with emotion regulation. Method: 10 individuals with unilateral right prefrontal damage and 15 matched healthy controls were compared on a well-known response modulation task. During the task participants had to amplify and suppress their facial emotional expressions, while watching film clips eliciting amusement. Measures of executive control, emotion regulation strategies usage and symptomatology were also collected. Results: As a group, individuals with rPFC damage presented a significantly reduced range of response modulation compared with controls. In addition, performance in the suppression task was associated with measures of cognitive inhibition and suppression usage. Interestingly, these effects were driven primarily by a subgroup of individuals with rPFC damage, all of whom also had damage to the right posterior insula, and who presented a marked impairment in suppressing facial emotional expression

Human Parahippocampal Cortex Supports Spatial Binding in Visual Working Memory

Studies investigating the functional organization of the medial temporal lobe (MTL) suggest that parahippocampal cortex (PHC) generates representations of spatial and contextual information used by the hippocampus in the formation of episodic memories. However, evidence from animal studies also implicates PHC in spatial binding of visual information held in short term, working memory. Here we examined a 46-year-old man (P.J.), after he had recovered from bilateral medial occipitotemporal cortex strokes resulting in ischemic lesions of PHC and hippocampal atrophy, and a group of age-matched healthy controls. When recalling the color of 1 of 2 objects, P.J. misidentified the target when cued by its location, but not shape. When recalling the position of 1 of 3 objects, he frequently misidentified the target, which was cued by its color. Increasing the duration of the memory delay had no impact on the proportion of binding errors, but did significantly worsen recall precision in both P.J. and controls. We conclude that PHC may play a crucial role in spatial binding during encoding of visual information in working memory.Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Counci