Jove
Visualize
Contact Us
JoVE
x logofacebook logolinkedin logoyoutube logo
ABOUT JoVE
OverviewLeadershipBlogJoVE Help Center
AUTHORS
Publishing ProcessEditorial BoardScope & PoliciesPeer ReviewFAQSubmit
LIBRARIANS
TestimonialsSubscriptionsAccessResourcesLibrary Advisory BoardFAQ
RESEARCH
JoVE JournalMethods CollectionsJoVE Encyclopedia of ExperimentsArchive
EDUCATION
JoVE CoreJoVE BusinessJoVE Science EducationJoVE Lab ManualFaculty Resource CenterFaculty Site
Terms & Conditions of Use
Privacy Policy
Policies

Related Experiment Videos

Visual short-term memory load affects sensory processing of irrelevant sounds in human auditory cortex.

Jussi Valtonen1, Patrick May, Ville Mäkinen

  • 1Apperception Cortical Dynamics (ACD), Department of Psychology, P.O. Box 9, University of Helsinki, FIN-00014 Helsinki, Finland. jussi.valtonen@helsinki.fi

Brain Research. Cognitive Brain Research
|July 26, 2003
PubMed
Summary

Related Concept Videos

You might also read

Related Articles

Articles linked to this work by shared authors, journal, and citation graph.

Sort by
Same author

Improving FAIRness of Geospatial data using Large Language Models.

Scientific data·2026
Same author

Selective vulnerability of dopaminergic neurons in Parkinson's disease connects PRKN and differential expression of CHCHD2 and GPNMB.

Cell death & disease·2026
Same author

Genetic variation in antidiabetic drug targets: associations with Parkinson's disease risk and age at onset.

NPJ Parkinson's disease·2026
Same author

PathoFact 2.0: an integrative pipeline for the prediction of antimicrobial resistance genes, virulence factors, toxins and toxin-associated proteins, and biosynthetic gene clusters in metagenomes.

GigaScience·2026
Same author

Flexible Data Integration for Genomics-Driven Decision Support in Rare Genetic Epilepsy.

Studies in health technology and informatics·2026
Same author

High-resolution multi-omics enhances prediction and detection of smORF-encoded proteins in the human gut microbiome.

Nature communications·2026

Short-term memory tasks for visual stimuli impact auditory cortex processing. Memory load enhances auditory N1m responses, showing cross-modal interactions between visual and auditory brain areas.

Area of Science:

  • Neuroscience
  • Cognitive Neuroscience
  • Auditory Perception

Background:

  • The human auditory cortex processes sound, but its activity can be influenced by other sensory modalities and cognitive tasks.
  • Understanding cross-modal interactions is crucial for comprehending brain function, especially how attention and memory affect sensory processing.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate how a short-term memory task in the visual modality affects neural activity in the human auditory cortex.
  • To determine if irrelevant auditory stimuli processing is modulated by visual memory load and task phase.

Main Methods:

  • Whole-head magnetoencephalography (MEG) was used to measure neural activity.
  • Participants performed a short-term memory task using visual stimuli while irrelevant auditory tones were presented.

Related Experiment Videos

  • A no-memory-task condition served as a baseline for comparison.

    • Main Results:

    • Memory load significantly enhanced the amplitude of the auditory N1m response compared to the no-memory-task condition.
    • Auditory N1m amplitude varied with the memory task phase, being larger during encoding than retention.
    • Modulations in N1m amplitude were associated with anterior-posterior shifts in N1m source locations.

    Conclusions:

    • Visual short-term memory tasks modulate sensory processing in the auditory cortex, even for ignored auditory stimuli.
    • Attentional allocation and short-term memory demands create interactions between visual and auditory brain areas.
    • These findings highlight the dynamic interplay between cognitive demands and sensory processing across different modalities.