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

Enhanced performance with brain stimulation: attentional shift or visual cue?

James Cavanaugh1, Bryan D Alvarez, Robert H Wurtz

  • 1Laboratory of Sensorimotor Research, National Eye Institute, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Maryland 20982-4435, USA. jrc@lsr.nei.nih.gov

The Journal of Neuroscience : the Official Journal of the Society for Neuroscience
|November 3, 2006
PubMed
Summary
This summary is machine-generated.

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

Disruption of hippocampal mitochondrial function underlies opioid-induced postoperative cognitive dysfunction in aged rats.

bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology·2026
Same author

Short-term high-fat diet impairs anterograde and retrograde memory consolidation, but not retrieval in aged rats.

Neuroscience·2026
Same author

The aged amygdala's unique sensitivity to refined diets, independent of fat or sugar content: A brain region and cell type-specific analysis.

Brain, behavior, and immunity·2025
Same author

Repeated 5-HT6 receptor activation facilitates flexible behavior in C57BL/6J mice.

Pharmacology, biochemistry, and behavior·2025
Same author

Ligature-induced periodontitis in a transgenic mouse model of Alzheimer's disease dysregulates neuroinflammation, exacerbates cognitive impairment, and accelerates amyloid pathology.

Brain, behavior, & immunity - health·2025
Same author

Obesity-associated memory impairment and neuroinflammation precede widespread peripheral perturbations in aged rats.

Immunity & ageing : I & A·2025
Same journal

Does stimulus preceding negativity reflect predictions in a somatosensory roving paradigm?

The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience·2026
Same journal

Temporal Dynamics of EEG Reflect Continuous Error Correction During Force Control.

The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience·2026
Same journal

Frontoparietal Hub Connectivity Integrates Information from Multiple Sources.

The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience·2026
Same journal

Mapping the Heart-Brain Continuum beyond Heart Failure: Why Neurology Matters.

The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience·2026
Same journal

Emergence of behavioral tinnitus in gerbils is associated with reduced spontaneous rates in single auditory nerve fibers.

The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience·2026
Same journal

Decoding the neural stages from action and object recognition to mentalizing.

The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience·2026
See all related articles

Electrical stimulation of the superior colliculus (SC) aids visual spatial attention. This study demonstrates that SC stimulation directly shifts attention, refuting the phosphene hypothesis and supporting the premotor theory of attention.

Area of Science:

  • Neuroscience
  • Cognitive Science
  • Visual Perception

Background:

  • The premotor theory of visual spatial attention posits that motor preparation, like saccades, enhances visual processing in the same location.
  • Electrical stimulation of areas like the frontal eye field and superior colliculus (SC) supports this theory by improving performance.
  • A key challenge is distinguishing direct attentional effects from potential phosphenes (illusory visual flashes) induced by stimulation.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To test the phosphene hypothesis regarding SC stimulation's effect on visual spatial attention.
  • To determine if electrical stimulation of the SC directly shifts attention or if it's an artifact of phosphenes.
  • To provide further evidence for the SC's role in the premotor theory of attention.

Main Methods:

Related Experiment Videos

  • Compared the effects of real visual stimuli versus electrical stimulation in the SC.
  • Manipulated the timing and location of SC electrical stimulation relative to visual stimuli.
  • Assessed performance changes under different stimulation conditions to evaluate the phosphene hypothesis.

Main Results:

  • Electrical stimulation of the SC improved performance, but presenting a real visual cue at the same time did not yield the same improvement.
  • Shifting SC stimulation timing or stimulating superficial visual neurons instead of deeper visual-motor neurons did not enhance performance.
  • The results indicate that phosphenes do not account for the attentional benefits of SC stimulation.

Conclusions:

  • Electrical stimulation of the superior colliculus directly facilitates visual spatial attention.
  • The phosphene hypothesis is unlikely to explain the observed performance improvements.
  • These findings strengthen the role of the SC in the premotor theory of attention.