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Attention modulates responses in the human lateral geniculate nucleus

Nature Neuroscience volume 5, pages 1203–1209 (2002)Cite this article

Abstract

Attentional mechanisms are important for selecting relevant information and filtering out irrelevant information from cluttered visual scenes. Selective attention has previously been shown to affect neural activity in both extrastriate and striate visual cortex. Here, evidence from functional brain imaging shows that attentional response modulation is not confined to cortical processing, but can occur as early as the thalamic level. We found that attention modulated neural activity in the human lateral geniculate nucleus (LGN) in several ways: it enhanced neural responses to attended stimuli, attenuated responses to ignored stimuli and increased baseline activity in the absence of visual stimulation. The LGN, traditionally viewed as the gateway to visual cortex, may also serve as a 'gatekeeper' in controlling attentional response gain.

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Figure 1: Visual stimuli and experimental design.
Figure 2: Time series of fMRI signals in the LGN (a–c) and visual cortex (d–f).
Figure 3: Attentional response modulation in the LGN and in visual cortical areas V1, V2, V3/VP, V4, TEO, V3A and MT/MST.
Figure 4: Spatial selectivity of attention effects in the LGN (a) and in visual cortex (b).
Figure 5: Frequency histograms of eye position for experiments 1 (top), 3 (middle) and 4 (bottom).

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Acknowledgements

We thank J. D. Cohen, G. M. Doniger, M. S. A. Graziano, C. G. Gross, J. V. Haxby, F. Tong and A. Treisman for valuable discussions, and M. Gilzenrat for help with eye movement measurements. Supported by National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowships to D.H.O. and M.A.P. and by grants from the National Institute of Mental Health and the Whitehall Foundation to S.K.

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  1. Department of Psychology, Center for the Study of Brain, Mind, and Behavior, Princeton University, Green Hall, Princeton, 08544, New Jersey, USA

    Daniel H. O'Connor, Miki M. Fukui, Mark A. Pinsk & Sabine Kastner

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  1. Daniel H. O'Connor
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Correspondence to Sabine Kastner.

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O'Connor, D., Fukui, M., Pinsk, M. et al. Attention modulates responses in the human lateral geniculate nucleus. Nat Neurosci 5, 1203–1209 (2002). https://doi.org/10.1038/nn957

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