title: Impaired Facilitatory Mechanisms of Auditory Attention After Damage of the Lateral Prefrontal Cortex.
abstract: There is growing evidence that auditory selective attention operates via distinct facilitatory and inhibitory mechanisms enabling selective enhancement and suppression of sound processing, respectively. The lateral prefrontal cortex (LPFC) plays a crucial role in the top-down control of selective attention. However, whether the LPFC controls facilitatory, inhibitory, or both attentional mechanisms is unclear. Facilitatory and inhibitory mechanisms were assessed, in patients with LPFC damage, by comparing event-related potentials (ERPs) to attended and ignored sounds with ERPs to these same sounds when attention was equally distributed to all sounds. In control subjects, we observed 2 late frontally distributed ERP components: a transient facilitatory component occurring from 150 to 250 ms after sound onset; and an inhibitory component onsetting at 250 ms. Only the facilitatory component was affected in patients with LPFC damage: this component was absent when attending to sounds delivered in the ear contralateral to the lesion, with the most prominent decreases observed over the damaged brain regions. These findings have 2 important implications: (i) they provide evidence for functionally distinct facilitatory and inhibitory mechanisms supporting late auditory selective attention; (ii) they show that the LPFC is involved in the control of the facilitatory mechanisms of auditory attention.
authors.affiliation: Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute, University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA Lyon Neuroscience Research Center, Brain Dynamics and Cognition Team, CRNL, INSERM U1028, CNRS UMR5292, University of Lyon 1, Lyon, France.
authors.forename: Aurélie
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Bidet-Caulet
authors.affiliation: Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute, University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA.
authors.forename: Kelly G
authors.initials: KG
authors.lastname: Buchanan
authors.affiliation: Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute, University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA.
authors.forename: Humsini
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Viswanath
authors.affiliation: Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute, University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA.
authors.forename: Jessica
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Black
authors.affiliation: Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute, University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA.
authors.forename: Donatella
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Scabini
authors.affiliation: Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute, University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA INSERM, UMR930, Université François-Rabelais de Tours, CHRU de Tours, France.
authors.forename: Frédérique
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Bonnet-Brilhault
authors.affiliation: Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute, University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA Department of Psychology, University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA.
authors.forename: Robert T
authors.initials: RT
authors.lastname: Knight
mesh_terms: D000161:Acoustic Stimulation; D001289:Attention Deficit Disorder with Hyperactivity / Q000209:etiology*; D001307:Auditory Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D001930:Brain Injuries / Q000150:complications* / Q000473:pathology*; D001931:Brain Mapping; D004569:Electroencephalography; D005072:Evoked Potentials, Auditory / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D007839:Functional Laterality; D006801:Humans; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D015225:Magnetoencephalography; D008297:Male; D008609:Mental Status Schedule; D008875:Middle Aged; D017397:Prefrontal Cortex / Q000503:physiopathology*; D011930:Reaction Time; D018709:Statistics, Nonparametric
keywords: EEG; attention; brain event-related potentials; frontal; lesion