A Matter Of Bottom Up Or Top Down Processes The Role Of Attention In Multisensory Integration
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A Matter of Bottom-Up or Top-Down Processes: The Role of Attention in Multisensory Integration
Author: Jess Hartcher-O'Brien
language: en
Publisher: Frontiers Media SA
Release Date: 2017-07-04
The integration of information from various sensory modalities influences behaviour. It can induce behavioural benefits such as faster reaction times and enhanced detection of noisy signals but may also produce illusions, all of which have been characterized by specific neuronal signatures. Yet, while these effects of multisensory integration are largely accepted, the role of attention in this process is still the object of intense debate. On the one hand, it has been suggested that attention may guide multisensory integration in a top-down fashion by selection of specific inputs to be integrated out of the plethora of information in our environment. On the other hand, there is evidence that integration could occur in a bottom-up manner, based on temporal and spatial correlations, and outside the focus of attention. An extreme example is the multisensory enhancement of neural responses in anesthetised animals. Attention itself is not a unitary construct, and may refer to a range of different selection mechanisms. Therefore, the interplay between attention and multisensory integration can take many forms which explain, in part, the diversity of findings and the disputes in the literature. The goal of this Research Topic is to help clarify the picture by trying to answer the following questions from various perspectives: Under which circumstances does multisensory integration take place without attention?, and, When does attention determine the fate of multisensory integration?
Turning the Mind’s Eye Inward: The Interplay between Selective Attention and Working Memory
Author: Elger Abrahamse
language: en
Publisher: Frontiers Media SA
Release Date: 2016-01-21
Historically, cognitive sciences have considered selective attention and working memory as largely separated cognitive functions. That is, selective attention as a concept is typically reserved for the processes that allow for the prioritization of specific sensory input, while working memory entails more central structures for maintaining (and operating on) temporary mental representations. However, over the last decades various observations have been reported that question such sharp distinction. Most importantly, information stored in working memory has been shown to modulate selective attention processing – and vice versa. At the theoretical level, these observations are paralleled by an increasingly dominant focus on working memory as (involving) the attended part of long-term memory, with some positions considering that working memory is equivalent to selective attention turned to long-term memory representations – or internal selective attention. This questions the existence of working memory as a dedicated cognitive function and raises the need for integrative accounts of working memory and attention. The next step will be to explore the precise implications of attentional accounts of WM for the understanding of specific aspects and characteristics of WM, such as serial order processing, its modality-specificity, its capacity limitations, its relation with executive functions, as well as the nature of attentional mechanisms involved. This research topic in Frontiers in Human Neuroscience aims at bringing together the latest insights and findings about the interplay between working memory and selective attention.
The New Handbook of Multisensory Processing
The major reference work for a rapidly advancing field synthesizes central themes, reports on current findings, and offers a blueprint for future research. Scientists' attempts to understand the physiology underlying our apprehension of the physical world was long dominated by a focus on the individual senses. The 1980s saw the beginning of systematic efforts to examine interactions among different sensory modalities at the level of the single neuron. And by the end of the 1990s, a recognizable and multidisciplinary field of "multisensory processes" had emerged. More recently, studies involving both human and nonhuman subjects have focused on relationships among multisensory neuronal ensembles and their behavioral, perceptual, and cognitive correlates. The New Handbook of Multisensory Processing synthesizes the central themes in this rapidly developing area, reports on current findings, and offers a blueprint for future research. The contributions, all of them written for this volume by leading experts, reflect the evolution and current state of the field. This handbook does more than simply review the field. Each of the volume's eleven sections broadly surveys a major topic, and each begins with a substantive and thought-provoking commentary by the section editor that identifies the major issues being explored, describes their treatment in the chapters that follow, and sets these findings within the context of the existing body of knowledge. Together, the commentaries and chapters provide an invaluable guide to areas of general agreement, unresolved issues, and topics that remain to be explored in this fast-moving field.