Journal Article

PreJuSER-15250

http://join2-wiki.gsi.de/foswiki/pub/Main/Artwork/join2_logo100x88.png Modality-Specific Perceptual Expectations Selectively Modulate Baseline Activity in Auditory, Somatosensory, and Visual Cortices

Langner, R.FZJ* ; Kellermann, T. ; Boers, F.FZJ* ; Sturm, W. ; Willmes, K. ; Eickhoff, S. B.FZJ*

2011
Oxford Univ. Press Oxford

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Please use a persistent id in citations: doi:10.1093/cercor/bhr083

Abstract: Valid expectations are known to improve target detection, but the preparatory attentional mechanisms underlying this perceptual facilitation remain an open issue. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging, we show here that expecting auditory, tactile, or visual targets, in the absence of stimulation, selectively increased baseline activity in corresponding sensory cortices and decreased activity in irrelevant ones. Regardless of sensory modality, expectancy activated bilateral premotor and posterior parietal areas, supplementary motor area as well as right anterior insula and right middle frontal gyrus. The bilateral putamen was sensitive to the modality specificity of expectations during the unexpected omission of targets. Thus, across modalities, detection improvement arising from selectively directing attention to a sensory modality appears mediated through transient changes in pretarget activity. This flexible advance modulation of baseline activity in sensory cortices resolves ambiguities among previous studies unable to discriminate modality-specific preparatory activity from attentional modulation of stimulus processing. Our results agree with predictive-coding models, which suggest that these expectancy-related changes reflect top-down biases--presumably originating from the observed supramodal frontoparietal network--that modulate signal-detection sensitivity by differentially modifying background activity (i.e., noise level) in different input channels. The putamen appears to code omission-related Bayesian "surprise" that depends on the specificity of predictions.

Keyword(s): Anticipation, Psychological: physiology (MeSH) ; Attention: physiology (MeSH) ; Auditory Cortex: physiology (MeSH) ; Brain Mapping (MeSH) ; Female (MeSH) ; Humans (MeSH) ; Image Interpretation, Computer-Assisted (MeSH) ; Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MeSH) ; Male (MeSH) ; Reaction Time: physiology (MeSH) ; Somatosensory Cortex: physiology (MeSH) ; Visual Cortex: physiology (MeSH) ; Young Adult (MeSH) ; J ; fMRI (auto) ; intermodal attention (auto) ; multimodal stimulus anticipation (auto) ; predictive coding (auto) ; surprise (auto)

Note: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (IRTG 1328 to R. L., K. W., and S. B. E.); Human Brain Project (R01-MH074457-01A1 to S. B. E.); Initiative and Networking Fund of the Helmholtz Association within the Helmholtz Alliance on Systems Biology (Human Brain Model to S. B. E).

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Contributing Institute(s):

1. Molekulare Organisation des Gehirns (INM-2)
2. Physik der Medizinischen Bildgebung (INM-4)

Research Program(s):

1. Funktion und Dysfunktion des Nervensystems (FUEK409) (FUEK409)
2. 89573 - Neuroimaging (POF2-89573) (POF2-89573)

Appears in the scientific report 2011

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