Premotor theory of attention

Question 1

Frontal and parietal cortex

Answer 1

Mediate the overt shift of attention, eg eye movements.

Activation (somewhat lateralised) overlaps w covert attention

Question 2

Premotor theory of attention

Answer 2

Attention is preparation for overt attention shift (eye movement or action)

focusing your attention on something is somewhat like making an eye movement.Neural data supports this idea

Question 3

Monkey study in support of this

Answer 3

Electrical stimulation of the FEF (leads to saccadic eye-movement bc of visuo-motor neurons in FEF)

Stimulated in a sub-threshold way, so monkey could maintain fixation. Simultaneously, had to detect a luminance target.

When the target sits in the movement field where they’re sub-thresholdly stimulated, they’re better able to detect it.

The monkey covertly attends to that location

Question 4

Monkey study V4 neurons

Answer 4

Also recorded V4 neurons to see if the activation is also increased like it does for attended location. Result: indeed stronger response, as if monkey is paying attention to that area

Very strong support for the premotor theory