Hemispheric Asymmetries in Deaf and Hearing During Sustained Peripheral Selective Attention

Area of Science:

• Neuroscience
• Auditory Neuroscience
• Cognitive Neuroscience

Background:

• Individuals with early-onset deafness often exhibit altered visual attention patterns, with a greater allocation to peripheral visual fields compared to hearing individuals.
• Prior research indicates differences in visual field attention between deaf and hearing populations, but the capacity for selective attention to specific peripheral locations remains less understood.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate whether deaf and hearing individuals differ in their ability to selectively attend to specific peripheral visual locations.
• To explore the neural underpinnings of peripheral selective attention in deaf and hearing individuals using electroencephalography (EEG).

Main Methods:

• Utilized EEG and a frequency tagging paradigm to assess selective attention to peripheral motion stimuli.
• Participants (deaf and hearing) attended to one of two peripheral displays with dots changing direction at distinct rates.

Main Results:

• Both groups demonstrated comparable modulation of EEG signals at attended and unattended frequencies, suggesting similar attentional control over peripheral motion.
• Deaf participants showed larger attentional effects in the right hemispheric region of interest (ROI), whereas hearing participants exhibited larger effects in the left ROI.

Conclusions:

• Deaf and hearing individuals possess similar capabilities for controlling peripheral attention to motion stimuli.
• A right hemispheric processing advantage for motion attention is suggested in deaf populations, contributing to existing evidence of cross-modal plasticity.