Integration of perception and conception in the human brain

人脑中感知和概念的整合

• 批准号: RGPIN-2020-05747
• 负责人: Barense, Morgan
• 金额: $ 5.68万
• 依托单位: University of Toronto
• 依托单位国家: 加拿大
• 项目类别: Discovery Grants Program - Individual
• 财政年份: 2021
• 资助国家: 加拿大
• 起止时间: 2021-01-01 至 2022-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nserc-crsng.gc.ca/ase-oro/Details-Detailles_eng.asp?id=740584
• 关键词: Integration; perception; conception; human; brain

In any given day, we interact with hundreds of objects. The ability to do so is central to our survival. When we look at an object - a hairdryer, for example - we are able to effortlessly recognize it and use it in a way that matches its function. We don't, for example, mistake it for the handheld power drill, despite the fact that they have a similar visual appearance and engage similar hand movements. And conversely, despite the fact that tape and glue neither look alike nor engage similar hand movements, we have no trouble recognizing that they would be both be suitable objects for the task of sticking two things together. Thus, in any given set of objects, many visual features will be highly similar and will not always have a direct correspondence with an object's identify. How, then, are we able to understand what we see? In a series of inter-related projects, we will address this question. We will focus on a core hypothesis: that the ability to understand and interact with objects depends on a particular kind of neural code. Specifically, we will argue that because neither perceptual nor conceptual features are perfectly diagnostic for an object's identity when considered on their own, the brain must integrate perceptual and conceptual features to make a highly specific object representation. We will show that these integrated representations are essential to behaving in a flexible manner when faced with many features that are distracting to the task at hand. Project 1 will use cutting-edge neuroimaging techniques to map information patterns in the brain. We predict to observe an integrated information code, such that when participants think about the visual attributes of objects, brain activity will also reflect the conceptual properties of those objects (and vice versa). We predict to observe this in the perirhinal cortex, a part of the brain that is connected both to regions important for perception, as well as to regions important for conceptual processing. Thus, it is well-placed to integrate these streams of information. Project 2 will investigate how behaviour is affected when this integrated information code is compromised. Specifically, we will work with patients who have perirhinal cortex damage due to an acute injury (e.g., an infection or tumor), and also those who have subtle perirhinal damage because they are in the early stages of Alzheimer's disease. Project 3 will investigate how different brain regions communicate with each other to understand how neural coding dynamically adapts based on task demands. Project 4 will investigate how object knowledge is formed in the first place - focusing on how information becomes integrated from multiple modalities to create a coherent representation if an object. For each project we will create large stimulus sets that precisely characterize the objects' perceptual and conceptual features. These stimulus sets may be helpful to other researchers, and so we will freely share them.

在任何一天，我们都会与数百个物体进行交互。这样做的能力对于我们的生存至关重要。当我们看到一个物体（例如吹风机）时，我们能够毫不费力地识别它并以与其功能相匹配的方式使用它。例如，我们不会将其误认为手持式电钻，尽管它们具有相似的视觉外观并进行相似的手部动作。相反，尽管胶带和胶水看起来并不相似，手部动作也不相似，但我们毫不费力地认识到它们都是将两个物体粘在一起的合适物体。因此，在任何给定的一组对象中，许多视觉特征将高度相似，并且并不总是与对象的标识具有直接对应关系。那么，我们怎样才能理解我们所看到的呢？在一系列相互关联的项目中，我们将解决这个问题。我们将重点关注一个核心假设：理解物体并与物体交互的能力取决于特定类型的神经代码。具体来说，我们认为，由于单独考虑时，感知和概念特征都不能完美地诊断对象的身份，因此大脑必须整合感知和概念特征以形成高度具体的对象表示。我们将证明，当面临许多分散手头任务注意力的特征时，这些集成表示对于以灵活的方式表现至关重要。项目 1 将使用尖端的神经影像技术来绘制大脑中的信息模式。我们预测观察一个集成的信息代码，这样当参与者思考物体的视觉属性时，大脑活动也会反映这些物体的概念属性（反之亦然）。我们预计会在鼻周皮层中观察到这一点，鼻周皮层是大脑的一部分，与感知重要的区域以及概念处理重要的区域相连。因此，它非常适合整合这些信息流。项目 2 将调查当此集成信息代码遭到破坏时行为会受到怎样的影响。具体来说，我们将治疗因急性损伤（例如感染或肿瘤）而导致鼻周皮质损伤的患者，以及因处于阿尔茨海默病早期阶段而导致鼻周皮质轻微损伤的患者。项目 3 将研究不同的大脑区域如何相互通信，以了解神经编码如何根据任务需求动态适应。项目 4 将首先研究对象知识是如何形成的 - 重点关注如何整合多种模式的信息以创建对象的连贯表示。对于每个项目，我们将创建大型刺激集，以精确表征对象的感知和概念特征。这些刺激集可能对其他研究人员有帮助，因此我们将自由分享它们。