Selective visual attention in a neurocomputational model of phase oscillators

In order to understand the dynamic property of covert selective visual attention, which is different from the proposed mechanism of the spotlight metaphor, a two-layered network of phase oscillators was developed. The first layer is related to the hippocampus and controls attention focus formation. The second layer is related to the visual cortex, and each cortical oscillator in it simulates an assembly of cells coding for a particular stimulus in the sense of feature binding. Selective visual attention is interpreted as the result of the emergent synchronization of hippocampus oscillators and a part of cortical oscillators. Numerical experiments are presented to illustrate attention focus formation and attention shifting from one set of stimuli to another. From a neurocomputational point of view, our results demonstrate that attention is an emergent property of the dynamical cell assemblies responding to the whole visual field.