McGovern Institute for Brain Research, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA.
Neuroimage. 2011 Jun 15;56(4):2356-63. doi: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2011.03.067. Epub 2011 Apr 5.
Neuroimaging studies have identified multiple face-selective regions in human cortex but the functional division of labor between these regions is not yet clear. A central hypothesis, with some empirical support, is that face-selective regions in the superior temporal sulcus (STS) are particularly responsive to dynamic information in faces, whereas the fusiform face area (FFA) computes the static or invariant properties of faces. Here we directly tested this hypothesis by measuring the magnitude of response in each region to both dynamic and static stimuli. Consistent with the hypothesis, we found that the response to movies of faces was not significantly different from the response to static images of faces from these same movies in the right FFA and right occipital face area (OFA). By contrast the face-selective region in the right posterior STS (pSTS) responded nearly three times as strongly to dynamic faces as to static faces, and a face-selective region in the right anterior STS (aSTS) responded to dynamic faces only. Both of these regions also responded more strongly to moving faces than to moving bodies, indicating that they are preferentially engaged in processing dynamic information from faces, not in more general processing of any dynamic social stimuli. The response to dynamic and static faces was not significantly different in a third face-selective region in the posterior continuation of the STS (pcSTS). The strong selectivity of face-selective regions in the pSTS and aSTS, but not the FFA, OFA or pcSTS, for dynamic face information demonstrates a clear functional dissociation between different face-selective regions, and provides further clues into their function.
神经影像学研究已经在人类大脑皮层中识别出了多个选择性面孔的区域，但这些区域的功能分工尚不清楚。一个具有一些实证支持的核心假设是，颞上沟（STS）中的选择性面孔区域对面孔中的动态信息特别敏感，而梭状回面孔区（FFA）则计算面孔的静态或不变属性。在这里，我们通过测量每个区域对动态和静态刺激的反应幅度，直接检验了这一假设。与假设一致，我们发现，右侧 FFA 和右侧枕部面孔区（OFA）中，电影面孔的反应与来自同一电影的静态面孔图像的反应没有显著差异。相比之下，右侧后颞上沟（pSTS）中的选择性面孔区域对动态面孔的反应几乎强三倍，而右侧前颞上沟（aSTS）仅对动态面孔有反应。这两个区域对运动的面孔的反应也比运动的身体强，这表明它们优先处理来自面孔的动态信息，而不是更一般地处理任何动态社会刺激。在 STS 后部延续区（pcSTS）的第三个选择性面孔区域中，动态和静态面孔的反应没有显著差异。pSTS 和 aSTS 中的选择性面孔区域对动态面孔信息的强烈选择性，但 FFA、OFA 或 pcSTS 则没有，这表明不同的选择性面孔区域之间存在明显的功能分离，并为它们的功能提供了进一步的线索。
