Iowa Neuroscience Institute, The University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA 52242, USA; Department of Neurology, The University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA 52242, USA.
Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, The University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA 52242, USA.
Curr Biol. 2017 Dec 4;27(23):R1264-R1265. doi: 10.1016/j.cub.2017.10.029.
Considerable research in cognitive science, neuroscience, and developmental science has revealed that the temporal, spatial, and numerical features of a stimulus can interact with one another [1,2], as when larger stimuli are perceived as lasting longer than smaller stimuli. These findings have inspired the prominent hypothesis that time, space, and number are processed by a 'common magnitude system', which represents these dimensions via the same unit of magnitude [3,4]. According to current theorizing, the parietal cortex mediates this system [4]. To test the species generality and neuroanatomical foundations of this hypothesis, we asked whether space-time interactions can be observed in birds. Unlike mammals, birds lack a cortex [5,6]; rather, they possess a neuron-dense pallium that is organized in clusters, in contrast to the laminar structure of the mammalian cortex [7]. Despite these striking neuroanatomical disparities, we observed reliable space-time interactions in pigeons. Our findings suggest that common magnitude systems are more widespread among animals than previously believed and need not be cortically dependent in all species.
大量认知科学、神经科学和发展科学的研究表明，刺激的时间、空间和数值特征可以相互作用[1,2]，例如，较大的刺激被感知为持续时间长于较小的刺激。这些发现激发了一个重要的假设，即时间、空间和数量是由一个“共同数量系统”来处理的，该系统通过相同的数量单位来表示这些维度[3,4]。根据目前的理论，顶叶皮层介导了这个系统[4]。为了检验这个假设在物种普遍性和神经解剖学基础上的有效性，我们询问是否可以在鸟类中观察到时空相互作用。与哺乳动物不同，鸟类没有皮层[5,6]；相反，它们拥有一个神经元密集的脑皮层，其组织成簇，与哺乳动物皮层的层状结构形成对比[7]。尽管存在这些显著的神经解剖学差异，我们还是在鸽子中观察到了可靠的时空相互作用。我们的发现表明，共同数量系统在动物中的分布比以前认为的更为广泛，并且在所有物种中不一定都依赖于皮层。
