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Published on: November 30, 2018
Nonstimulated early visual areas carry information about surrounding context
1Centre for Cognitive Neuroimaging, Institute of Neuroscience & Psychology, College of Medical, Veterinary & Life Sciences, University of Glasgow, Glasgow G12 8QB, United Kingdom. fws252@gmail.com
Summary
Visual context influences early visual areas like primary visual cortex (V1) and V2, even without direct stimulation. Activity patterns in nonstimulated regions reveal surrounding visual information, primarily driven by V1.
Area of Science:
- Neuroscience
- Visual Perception
- Cognitive Neuroscience
Background:
- Cortical neurons receive most input from other cortical neurons, not just direct sensory input.
- Lateral and feedback connections play a crucial role in transmitting contextual information within the brain.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate how visually nonstimulated regions in primary visual cortex (V1) and visual area V2 are influenced by surrounding visual context.
- To understand the role of lateral and feedback connections in early visual processing.
Main Methods:
- Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) was employed to measure brain activity.
- Pattern-classification methods were used to analyze fMRI data and decode information content.
Main Results:
- The cortical representation of a nonstimulated visual field contains information that can discriminate the surrounding visual context.
- Activity patterns in these nonstimulated regions are significantly related to patterns from feed-forward stimulation.
- These contextual influences on early visual areas are primarily driven by V1.
Conclusions:
- Visual context exerts a strong influence on early visual areas, including V1 and V2.
- This influence occurs even in the absence of direct, differential feed-forward thalamic stimulation.
- The findings highlight the importance of recurrent processing in shaping visual perception.
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