Attention

Controlling how information flows through the brain

Attention as Information Selection

– consider a simple visual scene:

Attention as Information Selection

– consider a simple visual scene:

Attention as Information Selection

– consider a simple visual scene:

– What happens in the brain when this scene appears?

Attention as Information Selection

– consider a slightly more complex scene

– What happens in the brain when this scene appears?

Attention as Information Selection

– consider a slightly more complex scene and a simple task:

– What has to happen in order for this task to be accomplished?

“point to the vertical line”

Attention as Information Selection

That might not seem complex because the visual target and the output “device” are represented by the same hemisphere

Attention as Information Selection

– What if the scene gets more complex?

– What has to happen in order for this task to be accomplished?

Attention as Information Selection

– What if the scene gets more complex?

– What has to happen in order for this task to be accomplished?

Attention as Information Selection

– What if the scene and task gets more complex: “Point to the red vertical line”?

– What has to happen in order for this task to be accomplished?

Attention as Information Selection

• problem: When those stimuli appear, activity begins simultaneously among many different neurons in the cortex. How does the rest of the brain (memory, motor planning, consciousness) know which is the target?– recall that the dorsal pathway doesn’t know anything about

orientation (or color or complex forms or identities)

– What if the scene is really complicated!?

Attention as Information Selection

Attention as Information Selection

• One conceptualization of attention is that it is the process by which irrelevant neural representations are disregarded (deemphasized? suppressed?)

• Another subtly different conceptualization is that attention is a process by which the neural representations of relevant stimuli are enhanced (emphasized? biased?)

Attention as Information Selection

• These ideas apply to other modalities– auditory “Cocktail Party”

problem

– somatosensory “I don’t feel my socks” problem