Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • News & Views
  • Published:

COGNITIVE NEUROSCIENCE

Does attention follow a rhythm?

Recent studies have suggested that attention switches rhythmically, with up to eight cycles per second. An article by Brookshire calls these results into question, showing that widely used methods in the field do not separate rhythmic from arrhythmic structure.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Access options

Buy this article

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Fig. 1: Schematic of general experimental approach to exploring temporal structure in behaviour.

References

  1. VanRullen, R. Trends Cogn. Sci. 20, 723–735 (2016).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  2. Fiebelkorn, I. C. & Kastner, S. Trends Cogn. Sci. 23, 87–101 (2019).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  3. Brookshire, G. Nat. Hum. Behav. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-022-01364-0 (2022).

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  4. Donoghue, T. et al. Nat. Neurosci. 23, 1655–1665 (2020).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  5. Wöstmann, M. et al. Neuropsychologia 146, 107505 (2020).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  6. Fiebelkorn, I. C. Eur. J. Neurosci. https://doi.org/10.1111/ejn.15322 (2021).

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  7. Helfrich, R. F. et al. Neuron 99, 854–865 (2018).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  8. Fiebelkorn, I. C., Pinsk, M. A. & Kastner, S. Neuron 99, 842–853 (2018).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  9. Landau, A. N., Schreyer, H. M., van Pelt, S. & Fries, P. Curr. Biol. 25, 2332–2337 (2015).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Malte Wöstmann.

Ethics declarations

Competing interests

The author declares no competing interests.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Wöstmann, M. Does attention follow a rhythm?. Nat Hum Behav 6, 1192–1193 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-022-01365-z

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-022-01365-z

Search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing