Engagement of the prefrontal cortex in representational momentum: an fMRI study

Behavioral studies have identified a robust phenomenon that an observer's memory of the final position of a moving target is shifted a little further in its motion direction, which is usually called representational momentum (RM). However, the neural substrates underlying RM are poorly understood. The current study measured hemodynamic responses in association with RM using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Two experiments using block and event-related designs, respectively, were conducted in which subjects compared the orientation of a probe rectangle with the remembered orientation of the final inducing figures in a set of rotating rectangles. Both experiments showed that, relative to the control task in which behavioral data did not show RM effects, RM task induced stronger activation in the prefrontal cortex. However, no activation was found in MT/MST complex in association with RM. The fMRI results suggest that RM may not simply reflect implicit motion perception and high level cognitive mechanisms underpinned by the prefrontal cortex may be involved in the RM effect.