Department of Psychology, Tufts University, 490 Boston Avenue, Medford, MA 02155, USA.
Brain Res. 2009 Oct 19;1294:91-105. doi: 10.1016/j.brainres.2009.07.036. Epub 2009 Jul 23.
Two-dimensional, mental rotation of alphanumeric characters and geometric figures is related to linear increases in parietal negativity between 400 and 800 ms as rotation increases, similar to linear increases with rotation in response times. This suggests that the frontoparietal networks implicated in mental rotation are engaged after 400 ms. However, the time course of three-dimensional object mental rotation using the classic Shepard-Metzler task has not been studied, even though this is one of the most commonly used versions in behavioral and neuroimaging work. Using this task, this study replicated a prior neuroimaging version using event-related potentials. Results confirmed linear mental rotation effects on performance and parietal negativity. In addition, a frontocentral N350 complex that indexes visual object cognition processes was more negative with mental rotation and showed linear trends at frontopolar sites from 200 to 700 ms and centrofrontal sites from 400 to 500 ms. The centrofrontal negativity has been implicated in object working memory processes in ventrolateral prefrontal and occipitotemporal areas. The frontopolar N350 has been implicated in processes that compute the spatial relations among parts of objects to resolve visual differences between object representations and enable an accurate cognitive decision involving a network of ventrocaudal intraparietal, ventral premotor, and inferotemporal cortices. Overall, the time course indicates that visual object cognition processes precede (200-500 ms) but also overlap the initial phase of mental rotation (500-700 ms) indexed by parietal negativity.
二维的字母数字字符和几何图形的心理旋转与顶区负性之间的线性增加有关，这种增加与旋转时反应时间的线性增加相似。这表明，心理旋转所涉及的额顶网络在 400 毫秒后被激活。然而，使用经典的 Shepard-Metzler 任务进行三维物体心理旋转的时间进程尚未被研究，尽管这是行为和神经影像学工作中最常用的版本之一。使用这个任务，本研究通过事件相关电位复制了先前的神经影像学版本。结果证实了心理旋转对表现和顶区负性的线性影响。此外，一个额中央 N350 复合体，它反映了视觉物体认知过程，在心理旋转时更负，并且在前额极和中央额区从 200 到 700 毫秒以及中央额区从 400 到 500 毫秒处呈现线性趋势。中央额负性已经被卷入到腹外侧前额叶和枕颞区域的物体工作记忆过程中。额极 N350 已经被卷入到计算物体各部分之间的空间关系的过程中，以解决物体表示之间的视觉差异，并使涉及腹侧顶内、腹侧前运动和下颞叶皮质的网络的准确认知决策成为可能。总的来说，时间进程表明，视觉物体认知过程先于（200-500 毫秒），但也与顶区负性所标记的心理旋转初始阶段（500-700 毫秒）重叠。
