INTEGRATION OF ERPS AND FMRI IN STUDIES OF ATTENTION

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DESCRIPTION (Adapted from applicant's abstract): Visual selective attention is a powerful brain mechanism that enables relevant sensory information to be effectively processed, while minimizing interference from irrelevant, distracting events. Despite more than three decades of psychophysical and physiological research, remarkably little is known about the neural mechanisms of this fundamental cognitive process in humans. In particular, precisely how various stages of visual processing are affected by selective spatial attention remains unclear. This proposal will investigate visual selective attention using a combined ERP and fMRI approach that permits both the functional anatomy (fMRI) and time course (ERPs) of attentional processes to be elucidated. The overall goal is to understand the role of selective attention in information processing in the human visual cortex, and to identify the detailed functional architecture of the systems involved. The mechanisms of voluntary spatial attention wi]l be investigated, and the relationship of spatial attention to feature, object and motion processing will be addressed. The proposed experiments have direct theoretical consequences for current physiological models of attentional selection by providing key evidence about both the anatomical locus and time course of attention-related modulations of neural processing in the intact human brain. In addition, because a combined ERP and fMRI approach is to be used, the relationship of electrocortical activity to changes in regional cerebral blood flow (CBF) during information processing will also be studied. Because deficits in attentional processes accompany various psychiatric, neurological and developmental disorders, investigations of the basic properties of human brain attention systems represent important core knowledge in the ongoing struggle to characterize, diagnose and treat such conditions in humans.