ADMIN · Interaction between posterior parietal and prefrontal cortices with occipital visual cortex in visual attention and perceptual decision making.
Horizon 2020 — Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions
- Duration
- 2017-08-01 → 2019-07-31
- EU contribution
- €169,333
- Participants
- 1
- Scheme
- MSCA-IF-EF-RI
Lines connect the coordinator with its partners.
Results in brief
Interaction between posterior parietal and prefrontal cortices with occipital visual cortex in visual attention and perceptual decision making.
Interacting with our environment is a complex task which requires to constantly weight and use different sources of information, whether they are sensory representation of the external world or cognitive, internally generated representation of our goals and expectations. For example, in order to detect a friend in a crowd, we compare sensory representation of what we are looking at (persons in the crowd) to representation of what we are looking for (our friend). This process, which I called comparative decision making, involves a large network of cortical and sub-cortical areas. Sensory information are extracted along the hierarchy of cortical visual areas located in the occipital lobe of human and non-human primates. Cognitive representation about goal directed information are supported by several areas of the prefrontal cortex (PFC). Finally, in a recent series of studies, I’ve proposed that areas of posterior parietal cortex (PPC) plays a crucial role during comparative decision making. Specifically, I’ve proposed that PPC integrates two types of information: 1) Bottom up flow of sensory information. In this framework, PPC integrates and combine this sensory flow, which was previously gated by top-down attention (a signal originating in the prefrontal cortex and which gates behaviorally relevant visual information). 2) Top-down information, originating in PFC, about the identity of the stimuli being actively searched. PPC then compares these information in order to encode a decision-related signal about the behavioral relevance of the stimuli. The main goal of this project (ADMIN) is to directly test this hypothesis. I will record simultaneously the activity of large population of neurons from the visual cortex, from PFC and from PPC while NHP perform a task in which they have to compare visual and goal-directed information. This task, a modified version of a delayed-match to sample task, allow us to directly test 1) how information is kept in working memory and encoded in PFC; 2) how this signal is transformed into top-down signal modulating the bottom-up flow of sensory information and 3) how PPC integrates and compares bottom up and top down signals in order to participate to decision making processes. This task, as well as the simultaneous recording of large populations of neurons in PPC, PFC and the visual cortex, will allow us to better understand how cognitive and sensory representation interact during decision-making. We will test (1) the computations performed by each cortical area as a function of the behavioral context, (2) how these cortical areas communicate, and (3) the role of the PPC in adapting our behavior to the different task demands. This will have an important impact on our understanding of deficits associated to PPC and PFC lesions and will help us redefined rehabilitation strategies.
Data: CORDIS, © European Union
Project objective
Detecting relevant and ignoring irrelevant visual stimuli of our environment is a fundamental yet challenging task which relies on at least 3 mechanisms all based on or requiring attention: 1) selecting relevant information for prioritizing their cortical processing 2) binding them into a single representation and 3) making a decision about the relevance of the analyzed stimulus. Visual attention is supported by top-down modulations, presumably originating in the prefrontal cortex (PFC). Such feedback modulations affect which sensory information that thereafter are transformed into perceptual decision, a task partly achieved by the Lateral Intraparietal area (LIP). However, no study has yet proposed a clear descriptive model of (i) how cortico-cortical connectivity allows contextual clues to dispatch attentional top-down modulations from the PFC toward the appropriate population of occipital visual neurons; (ii) and how LIP neurons integrate and bind the representation of relevant features encoded by these occipital visual neurons.Here we propose to fill these gaps by recording simultaneously the activity of population of PFC, V4 and LIP neurons during performance of a task which requires to alternatively allocate attention toward different set of spatial and non-spatial visual features. We will first characterize the dynamic modulation of PFC population activity specifically linked to attention control. Then, to test how top-down modulations selectively target visual neurons, we will study how such modulations of PFC activity are linked to V4 population gain control. Lastly, we will characterize how LIP read-out the shaping of V4 population activity to encode the appropriate perceptual decision.This pioneer approach will highlight how parieto-frontal areas interact with visual cortices in order to encode reliable decisions. It will un-doubtfully be of highest relevance to scientists and clinicians interested in the study of attention and its related-deficits.
Original text from CORDIS.
Participants
- CENTRE NATIONAL DE LA RECHERCHE SCIENTIFIQUE CNRS · ParisCoordinatorFrance
Links
Data: CORDIS, © European Union