Attending to the thalamus: inhibition of return and nasal-temporal asymmetry in the pulvinar.
Inhibition of return (IOR) is a mechanism whereby the attentional system favors novel locations by inhibiting already scanned ones. An important question is what the neural structures are involved. Recently, we studied a patient with damage to the superior colliculus (SC) and concluded that the SC generates IOR. However, it is possible that IOR is generated beyond the colliculus, for example, by the pulvinar. In this paper we tested three patients with unilateral damage to the pulvinar and demonstrated that the pulvinar is not necessary for IOR generation, providing additional support to the suggestion that the SC generates IOR. In addition, since we used monocular presentation, we were able to furnish behavioral evidence for nasal-temporal asymmetrical representation of visual input in the pulvinar.
Sapir
Ayelet
A
Department of Behavioral Sciences and Zlotowski Center for Neuroscience, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Beer-Sheva, Israel.
Rafal
Robert
R
Henik
Avishai
A
D000704:Analysis of Variance; D005260:Female; D007839:Functional Laterality / Q000502:physiology; D006801:Humans; D007266:Inhibition, Psychological; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009433:Neural Inhibition / Q000502:physiology; D010775:Photic Stimulation / Q000379:methods; D020649:Pulvinar / Q000293:injuries* / Q000502:physiology*; D011930:Reaction Time / Q000502:physiology; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D013477:Superior Colliculi / Q000502:physiology; D013788:Thalamus / Q000502:physiology*; D014794:Visual Fields / Q000502:physiology