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Goldstein-Marcusohn Y, Asaad R, Asaad L, Freud E. The large-scale organization of shape processing in the ventral and dorsal pathways is dissociable from attention. Cereb Cortex 2024; 34:bhae221. [PMID: 38832533 PMCID: PMC11148664 DOI: 10.1093/cercor/bhae221] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/24/2024] [Revised: 05/02/2024] [Accepted: 05/09/2024] [Indexed: 06/05/2024] Open
Abstract
The two visual pathways model posits that visual information is processed through two distinct cortical systems: The ventral pathway promotes visual recognition, while the dorsal pathway supports visuomotor control. Recent evidence suggests the dorsal pathway is also involved in shape processing and may contribute to object perception, but it remains unclear whether this sensitivity is independent of attentional mechanisms that were localized to overlapping cortical regions. To address this question, we conducted two fMRI experiments that utilized different parametric scrambling manipulations in which human participants viewed novel objects in different levels of scrambling and were instructed to attend to either the object or to another aspect of the image (e.g. color of the background). Univariate and multivariate analyses revealed that the large-scale organization of shape selectivity along the dorsal and ventral pathways was preserved regardless of the focus of attention. Attention did modulate shape sensitivity, but these effects were similar across the two pathways. These findings support the idea that shape processing is at least partially dissociable from attentional processes and relies on a distributed set of cortical regions across the visual pathways.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yael Goldstein-Marcusohn
- Department of Psychology and the Centre for Vision Research, York University, 4700 Keele St, Toronto, ON M3J 1P3, Canada
| | - Rahaf Asaad
- Department of Psychology and the Centre for Vision Research, York University, 4700 Keele St, Toronto, ON M3J 1P3, Canada
| | - Leen Asaad
- Department of Psychology and the Centre for Vision Research, York University, 4700 Keele St, Toronto, ON M3J 1P3, Canada
| | - Erez Freud
- Department of Psychology and the Centre for Vision Research, York University, 4700 Keele St, Toronto, ON M3J 1P3, Canada
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Manley CE, Walter K, Micheletti S, Tietjen M, Cantillon E, Fazzi EM, Bex PJ, Merabet LB. Object identification in cerebral visual impairment characterized by gaze behavior and image saliency analysis. Brain Dev 2023; 45:432-444. [PMID: 37188548 PMCID: PMC10524860 DOI: 10.1016/j.braindev.2023.05.001] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/31/2023] [Revised: 04/26/2023] [Accepted: 05/01/2023] [Indexed: 05/17/2023]
Abstract
Individuals with cerebral visual impairment (CVI) have difficulties identifying common objects, especially when presented as cartoons or abstract images. In this study, participants were shown a series of images of ten common objects, each from five possible categories ranging from abstract black & white line drawings to color photographs. Fifty individuals with CVI and 50 neurotypical controls verbally identified each object and success rates and reaction times were collected. Visual gaze behavior was recorded using an eye tracker to quantify the extent of visual search area explored and number of fixations. A receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis was also carried out to compare the degree of alignment between the distribution of individual eye gaze patterns and image saliency features computed by the graph-based visual saliency (GBVS) model. Compared to controls, CVI participants showed significantly lower success rates and longer reaction times when identifying objects. In the CVI group, success rate improved moving from abstract black & white images to color photographs, suggesting that object form (as defined by outlines and contours) and color are important cues for correct identification. Eye tracking data revealed that the CVI group showed significantly greater visual search areas and number of fixations per image, and the distribution of eye gaze patterns in the CVI group was less aligned with the high saliency features of the image compared to controls. These results have important implications in helping to understand the complex profile of visual perceptual difficulties associated with CVI.
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Affiliation(s)
- Claire E Manley
- The Laboratory for Visual Neuroplasticity, Department of Ophthalmology, Massachusetts Eye and Ear, Harvard Medical School, Boston, USA
| | - Kerri Walter
- Translational Vision Lab. Department of Psychology, Northeastern University, Boston, MA, USA
| | - Serena Micheletti
- Unit of Child Neurology and Psychiatry, ASST Spedali Civili of Brescia, Brescia, Italy; Department of Clinical and Experimental Sciences, University of Brescia, Brescia, Italy
| | - Matthew Tietjen
- The Laboratory for Visual Neuroplasticity, Department of Ophthalmology, Massachusetts Eye and Ear, Harvard Medical School, Boston, USA
| | - Emily Cantillon
- The Laboratory for Visual Neuroplasticity, Department of Ophthalmology, Massachusetts Eye and Ear, Harvard Medical School, Boston, USA
| | - Elisa M Fazzi
- Unit of Child Neurology and Psychiatry, ASST Spedali Civili of Brescia, Brescia, Italy; Department of Clinical and Experimental Sciences, University of Brescia, Brescia, Italy
| | - Peter J Bex
- Translational Vision Lab. Department of Psychology, Northeastern University, Boston, MA, USA
| | - Lotfi B Merabet
- The Laboratory for Visual Neuroplasticity, Department of Ophthalmology, Massachusetts Eye and Ear, Harvard Medical School, Boston, USA.
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Wei L, Li X, Huang L, Liu Y, Hu L, Shen W, Ding Q, Liang P. An fMRI study of visual geometric shapes processing. Front Neurosci 2023; 17:1087488. [PMID: 37008223 PMCID: PMC10062448 DOI: 10.3389/fnins.2023.1087488] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/03/2022] [Accepted: 02/28/2023] [Indexed: 03/18/2023] Open
Abstract
Cross-modal correspondence has been consistently evidenced between shapes and other sensory attributes. Especially, the curvature of shapes may arouse the affective account, which may contribute to understanding the mechanism of cross-modal integration. Hence, the current study used the functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) technique to examine brain activity’s specificity when people view circular and angular shapes. The circular shapes consisted of a circle and an ellipse, while the angular shapes consisted of a triangle and a star. Results show that the brain areas activated by circular shapes mainly involved the sub-occipital lobe, fusiform gyrus, sub and middle occipital gyrus, and cerebellar VI. The brain areas activated by angular shapes mainly involve the cuneus, middle occipital gyrus, lingual gyrus, and calcarine gyrus. The brain activation patterns of circular shapes did not differ significantly from those of angular shapes. Such a null finding was unexpected when previous cross-modal correspondence of shape curvature was considered. The different brain regions detected by circular and angular shapes and the potential explanations were discussed in the paper.
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Affiliation(s)
- Liuqing Wei
- Department of Psychology, Faculty of Education, Hubei University, Wuhan, China
- Brain and Cognition Research Center, Faculty of Education, Hubei University, Wuhan, China
| | - Xueying Li
- Department of Psychology, Faculty of Education, Hubei University, Wuhan, China
| | - Lina Huang
- Imaging Department, Changshu No. 2 People’s Hospital, The Clinical Medical College Affiliated to Xuzhou Medical University, Changshu, China
| | - Yuansheng Liu
- Department of Psychology, Faculty of Education, Hubei University, Wuhan, China
| | - Luming Hu
- Department of Psychology, School of Arts and Sciences, Beijing Normal University, Zhuhai, China
| | - Wenbin Shen
- Imaging Department, Changshu No. 2 People’s Hospital, The Clinical Medical College Affiliated to Xuzhou Medical University, Changshu, China
| | - Qingguo Ding
- Imaging Department, Changshu No. 2 People’s Hospital, The Clinical Medical College Affiliated to Xuzhou Medical University, Changshu, China
- *Correspondence: Qingguo Ding,
| | - Pei Liang
- Department of Psychology, Faculty of Education, Hubei University, Wuhan, China
- Brain and Cognition Research Center, Faculty of Education, Hubei University, Wuhan, China
- Imaging Department, Changshu No. 2 People’s Hospital, The Clinical Medical College Affiliated to Xuzhou Medical University, Changshu, China
- Pei Liang,
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Unilateral resection of both cortical visual pathways in a pediatric patient alters action but not perception. Neuropsychologia 2022; 168:108182. [PMID: 35182580 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2022.108182] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/07/2021] [Revised: 12/21/2021] [Accepted: 02/08/2022] [Indexed: 11/23/2022]
Abstract
The human cortical visual system consists of two major pathways, a ventral pathway that subserves perception and a dorsal pathway that primarily subserves visuomotor control. Previous studies have found that children with cortical resections of the ventral visual pathway retain largely normal visuoperceptual abilities. Whether visually guided actions, supported by computations carried out by the dorsal pathway, follow a similar pattern of preservation remains unknown. To address this question, we examined visuoperceptual and visuomotor behaviors in a pediatric patient, TC, who underwent a cortical resection that included portions of the left ventral and dorsal pathways. We collected kinematic data when TC used her right and left hands to perceptually estimate the width of blocks that varied in width and length, and, separately, to grasp the same blocks. TC's perceptual estimation performance was comparable to that of controls, independent of the hand used. In contrast, relative to controls, she showed reduced visuomotor sensitivity to object shape and this was more evident when she grasped the objects with her contralesional right hand. These results provide novel evidence for a striking difference in the competence of the two visual pathways to cortical injuries acquired in childhood.
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Papale P, Leo A, Handjaras G, Cecchetti L, Pietrini P, Ricciardi E. Shape coding in occipito-temporal cortex relies on object silhouette, curvature, and medial axis. J Neurophysiol 2020; 124:1560-1570. [PMID: 33052726 DOI: 10.1152/jn.00212.2020] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 01/26/2023] Open
Abstract
Object recognition relies on different transformations of the retinal input, carried out by the visual system, that range from local contrast to object shape and category. While some of those transformations are thought to occur at specific stages of the visual hierarchy, the features they represent are correlated (e.g., object shape and identity) and selectivity for the same feature overlaps in many brain regions. This may be explained either by collinearity across representations or may instead reflect the coding of multiple dimensions by the same cortical population. Moreover, orthogonal and shared components may differently impact distinctive stages of the visual hierarchy. We recorded functional MRI activity while participants passively attended to object images and employed a statistical approach that partitioned orthogonal and shared object representations to reveal their relative impact on brain processing. Orthogonal shape representations (silhouette, curvature, and medial axis) independently explained distinct and overlapping clusters of selectivity in the occitotemporal and parietal cortex. Moreover, we show that the relevance of shared representations linearly increases moving from posterior to anterior regions. These results indicate that the visual cortex encodes shared relations between different features in a topographic fashion and that object shape is encoded along different dimensions, each representing orthogonal features.NEW & NOTEWORTHY There are several possible ways of characterizing the shape of an object. Which shape description better describes our brain responses while we passively perceive objects? Here, we employed three competing shape models to explain brain representations when viewing real objects. We found that object shape is encoded in a multidimensional fashion and thus defined by the interaction of multiple features.
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Affiliation(s)
- Paolo Papale
- Molecular Mind Laboratory, IMT School for Advanced Studies Lucca, Italy.,Department of Vision and Cognition, Netherlands Institute for Neuroscience, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
| | - Andrea Leo
- Molecular Mind Laboratory, IMT School for Advanced Studies Lucca, Italy.,Department of Translational Research and Advanced Technologies in Medicine and Surgery, University of Pisa, Pisa, Italy
| | - Giacomo Handjaras
- Molecular Mind Laboratory, IMT School for Advanced Studies Lucca, Italy
| | - Luca Cecchetti
- Molecular Mind Laboratory, IMT School for Advanced Studies Lucca, Italy
| | - Pietro Pietrini
- Molecular Mind Laboratory, IMT School for Advanced Studies Lucca, Italy
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Ionta S, Costantini M, Ferretti A, Galati G, Romani GL, Aglioti SM. Visual similarity and psychological closeness are neurally dissociable in the brain response to vicarious pain. Cortex 2020; 133:295-308. [PMID: 33160159 DOI: 10.1016/j.cortex.2020.09.028] [Citation(s) in RCA: 14] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/08/2020] [Revised: 07/13/2020] [Accepted: 09/28/2020] [Indexed: 12/30/2022]
Abstract
Personal and vicarious experience of pain activate partially overlapping brain networks. This brain activity is further modulated by low- and high-order factors, e.g., the perceived intensity of the model's pain and the model's similarity with the onlooker, respectively. We investigated which specific aspect of similarity modulates such empathic reactivity, focusing on the potential differentiation between visual similarity and psychological closeness between the onlooker and different types of models. To this aim, we recorded fMRI data in neurotypical participants who observed painful and tactile stimuli delivered to an adult human hand, a baby human hand, a puppy dog paw, and an anthropomorphic robotic hand. The interaction between type of vicarious experience (pain, touch) and nature of model (adult, baby, dog, robot) showed that the right supramarginal gyrus (rSMG) was selectively active for visual similarity (more active during vicarious pain for the adult and baby models), while the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) was more sensitive to psychological closeness (specifically linked to vicarious pain for the baby model). These findings indicate that visual similarity and psychological closeness between onlooker and model differentially affect the activity of brain regions specifically implied in encoding interindividual sharing of sensorimotor and affective aspects of vicarious pain, respectively.
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Affiliation(s)
- Silvio Ionta
- Sensory-Motor Lab (SeMoLa), Department of Ophthalmology-University of Lausanne, Jules Gonin Eye Hospital-Fondation Asile des Aveugles, Lausanne, Switzerland; Department of Neuroscience, Imaging and Clinical Science, University G. D'Annunzio, Chieti, Italy; Institute of Advanced Biomedical Technologies, University G. D'Annunzio, Chieti, Italy; CNLS@Sapienza, Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia, Sapienza University of Rome, Italy.
| | - Marcello Costantini
- Department of Psychological, Health and Territorial Sciences, University G. D'Annunzio, Chieti-Pescara, Italy
| | - Antonio Ferretti
- Department of Neuroscience, Imaging and Clinical Science, University G. D'Annunzio, Chieti, Italy; Institute of Advanced Biomedical Technologies, University G. D'Annunzio, Chieti, Italy
| | - Gaspare Galati
- Department of Psychology, University of Rome "La Sapienza", Italy; IRCCS "Fondazione Santa Lucia", Rome, Italy
| | - Gian Luca Romani
- Institute of Advanced Biomedical Technologies, University G. D'Annunzio, Chieti, Italy
| | - Salvatore M Aglioti
- CNLS@Sapienza, Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia, Sapienza University of Rome, Italy; IRCCS "Fondazione Santa Lucia", Rome, Italy.
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Freud E, Behrmann M, Snow JC. What Does Dorsal Cortex Contribute to Perception? Open Mind (Camb) 2020; 4:40-56. [PMID: 33225195 PMCID: PMC7672309 DOI: 10.1162/opmi_a_00033] [Citation(s) in RCA: 17] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/06/2020] [Accepted: 05/20/2020] [Indexed: 01/26/2023] Open
Abstract
According to the influential "Two Visual Pathways" hypothesis, the cortical visual system is segregated into two pathways, with the ventral, occipitotemporal pathway subserving object perception, and the dorsal, occipitoparietal pathway subserving the visuomotor control of action. However, growing evidence suggests that the dorsal pathway also plays a functional role in object perception. In the current article, we present evidence that the dorsal pathway contributes uniquely to the perception of a range of visuospatial attributes that are not redundant with representations in ventral cortex. We describe how dorsal cortex is recruited automatically during perception, even when no explicit visuomotor response is required. Importantly, we propose that dorsal cortex may selectively process visual attributes that can inform the perception of potential actions on objects and environments, and we consider plausible developmental and cognitive mechanisms that might give rise to these representations. As such, we consider whether naturalistic stimuli, such as real-world solid objects, might engage dorsal cortex more so than simplified or artificial stimuli such as images that do not afford action, and how the use of suboptimal stimuli might limit our understanding of the functional contribution of dorsal cortex to visual perception.
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Affiliation(s)
- Erez Freud
- Department of Psychology and the Centre for Vision Research, York University
| | - Marlene Behrmann
- Department of Psychology and the Neuroscience Institute, Carnegie Mellon University
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