Attentional selection of location and modality in vision and touch modulates low-frequency activity in associated sensory cortices.
Selective attention allows us to focus on particular sensory modalities and locations. Relatively little is known about how attention to a sensory modality may relate to selection of other features, such as spatial location, in terms of brain oscillations, although it has been proposed that low-frequency modulation (α- and β-bands) may be key. Here, we investigated how attention to space (left or right) and attention to modality (vision or touch) affect ongoing low-frequency oscillatory brain activity over human sensory cortex. Magnetoencephalography was recorded while participants performed a visual or tactile task. In different blocks, touch or vision was task-relevant, whereas spatial attention was cued to the left or right on each trial. Attending to one or other modality suppressed α-oscillations over the corresponding sensory cortex. Spatial attention led to reduced α-oscillations over both sensorimotor and occipital cortex contralateral to the attended location in the cue-target interval, when either modality was task-relevant. Even modality-selective sensors also showed spatial-attention effects for both modalities. The visual and sensorimotor results were generally highly convergent, yet, although attention effects in occipital cortex were dominant in the α-band, in sensorimotor cortex, these were also clearly present in the β-band. These results extend previous findings that spatial attention can operate in a multimodal fashion and indicate that attention to space and modality both rely on similar mechanisms that modulate low-frequency oscillations.
University College London Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience and Wellcome Trust Centre for Neuroimaging, 12 Queen Square, London, WC1N3BG, United Kingdom. markus.bauer@gmail.com
Markus
M
Bauer
Steffan
S
Kennett
Jon
J
Driver
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000818:Animals; D001288:Attention / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D015225:Magnetoencephalography / Q000379:methods; D008297:Male; D010775:Photic Stimulation / Q000379:methods; D010812:Physical Stimulation / Q000379:methods; D013003:Somatosensory Cortex / Q000502:physiology*; D013028:Space Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D014110:Touch / Q000502:physiology*; D014793:Visual Cortex / Q000502:physiology*; D014796:Visual Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D055815:Young Adult