Neuroscience Center for Research and Innovation (NX), Learning Institute, King Mongkut's University of Technology Thonburi, Bangkok 10140, Thailand.
Chula Neuroscience Center, King Chulalongkorn Memorial Hospital, Thai Red Cross Society, Bangkok 10330, Thailand.
J Neurosci. 2024 Aug 14;44(33):e2012232024. doi: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.2012-23.2024.
Adaptive behaviors require the ability to resolve conflicting information caused by the processing of incompatible sensory inputs. Prominent theories of attention have posited that early selective attention helps mitigate cognitive interference caused by conflicting sensory information by facilitating the processing of task-relevant sensory inputs and filtering out behaviorally irrelevant information. Surprisingly, many recent studies that investigated the role of early selective attention on conflict mitigation have failed to provide positive evidence. Here, we examined changes in the selectivity of early visuospatial attention in male and female human subjects performing an attention-cueing Eriksen flanker task, where they discriminated the shape of a visual target surrounded by congruent or incongruent distractors. We used the inverted encoding model to reconstruct spatial representations of visual selective attention from the topographical patterns of amplitude modulations in alpha band oscillations in scalp EEG (∼8-12 Hz). We found that the fidelity of the alpha-based spatial reconstruction was significantly higher in the incongruent compared with the congruent condition. Importantly, these conflict-related modulations in the reconstruction fidelity occurred at a much earlier time window than those of the lateralized posterior event-related potentials associated with target selection and distractor suppression processes, as well as conflict-related modulations in the frontocentral negative-going wave and midline-frontal theta oscillations (∼3-7 Hz), thought to track executive control functions. Taken together, our data suggest that conflict resolution is supported by the cascade of neural processes underlying early selective visuospatial attention and frontal executive functions that unfold over time.
适应行为需要能够解决由处理不兼容的感觉输入引起的冲突信息。注意力的突出理论假设，早期选择性注意通过促进任务相关感觉输入的处理和过滤掉行为上不相关的信息，有助于减轻由冲突感觉信息引起的认知干扰。令人惊讶的是，许多最近研究早期选择性注意在减轻冲突中的作用的研究未能提供积极的证据。在这里，我们研究了男性和女性人类受试者在执行注意力提示埃里森侧翼任务时早期视空间注意力选择性的变化，在该任务中，他们辨别视觉目标的形状，该目标被一致或不一致的分心物包围。我们使用反转编码模型，从头皮 EEG（∼8-12Hz）中的 alpha 波段振荡的幅度调制的拓扑模式中重建视觉选择性注意的空间表示。我们发现，在不一致条件下，基于 alpha 的空间重建的保真度明显高于一致条件。重要的是，这些与冲突相关的重建保真度的调制发生在比与目标选择和分心物抑制过程相关的侧化后事件相关电位以及与冲突相关的额中央负向波和中线额theta 振荡（∼3-7Hz）调制更早的时间窗口，这些被认为与执行控制功能有关。总之，我们的数据表明，冲突解决是由早期选择性视空间注意和额叶执行功能的神经过程级联支持的，这些过程随时间展开。
