The Development of Visual Integration & Attention: A High-Density EEG Study

描述（由申请人提供）：关于皮质功能如何发展的知识很少。我建议通过测量儿童（6-10岁）、青少年（13-15岁）和成人（6- 15岁）对视觉整体整合和注意选择性的神经反应来表征皮层发育。18岁)。全局集成是分布式特性允许检测模式的过程。传统观点认为，基于形式的整体整合由腹侧视觉区处理，而运动则由背侧视觉区处理。最近的证据表明，与只需要特征检测的任务相比，全局整合的成熟相对较晚。此外，有证据表明，形式整合和动作整合具有不同的发展轨迹。为了检验形式和运动整合的关系，我们将测量与玻璃图案和连贯运动相关的皮质活动，随机点的拷贝产生刺激。虽然可以区分为旋转、扩张或平移，但这些刺激提供了较弱的局部定向或方向线索，使其成为研究全球整合的理想刺激。通过利用视觉诱发电位（VEP）和磁共振成像（MRI）数据，我计划测试三个主要假设：(1)形式和运动整合是由单独的腹侧和背侧皮质区域处理的；(2)形式处理的成熟速度与运动处理的成熟速度不同；(3)由于控制执行控制的机制不成熟，儿童和成人的持续注意力对整体整合的影响是不同的。这些研究将使我们更好地了解整体形式和运动整合是如何相关的，以及这种关系是否随着视觉系统的成熟而改变。了解皮质功能在典型视觉发育中的行为，可能有助于深入了解非典型视觉发育的过程。这一信息在已经发现背侧和腹侧视觉功能存在差异的特殊人群中尤为重要，例如弱视、阅读障碍、自闭症、威廉姆斯综合征和特纳综合征。此外，VEP反应与解剖和功能mri的耦合是一种新技术，可以用于研究典型和非典型发育的神经活动，因为参与者不需要长时间的fMRI扫描，这可能会给幼儿和有特殊需要的人带来焦虑和不适。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): There is minimal knowledge on how cortical functions develop. I propose to characterize cortical development by measuring neural responses to visual global integration and attentional selectivity in children (6-10 year olds), adolescents (13-15 year olds) and adults (?18 year olds). Global integration is the process by which distributed features allow a pattern to be detected. It is classically thought that global integration based on form is processed by ventral visual areas while motion is processed by dorsal visual areas. Recent evidence suggests that global integration has relatively late maturation compared to tasks that only require feature detection. Moreover, evidence suggests that form and motion integration have different developmental trajectories. To examine the relationship of form and motion integration, we will measure cortical activity related to Glass pattern and coherent motion, stimuli created from copies of random dots. Although distinguishable as rotation, expansion or translation, these stimuli provide weak local orientation or direction cues, making them ideal stimuli in investigating global integration. By utilizing visually evoked potentials (VEP) coupled with magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) data, I plan to test three main hypotheses: (1) that form and motion integration are processed by separate ventral and dorsal cortical areas, (2) that form processing has a different maturation rate than motion processing, and (3) that the effects of sustained attention on global integration is different in children and adults due to immature mechanisms that govern executive control. PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE These studies will give us a better understanding how global form and motion integration may be related, and if this relationship changes as the visual system matures. Knowing how cortical function behaves in typical visual development may provide insight into the processes involved in atypical visual development. This information is especially important in special populations in which differences between dorsal and ventral visual functions have been found, such as in amblyopia, dyslexia, autism, Williams Syndrome and Turner Syndrome. In addition, the coupling of VEP responses to anatomical and functional MRIs is a novel technique that can be useful for investigating neural activity across typical and atypical development because participants are not subjected to long-duration fMRI scans, which can create anxiety and discomfort in young children and in people with special needs.