Abstract
Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) is increasingly used as a method to modify and study functional brain activity. However, results from various studies have produced conflicting theories on how TMS of cortical tissue influences ongoing visual processing. To investigate this issue, single pulse TMS was applied over left V1 in five healthy subjects during an orientation discrimination task (vertical vs. horizontal) using a Gabor patch (2 c/deg, presented 6° in the right visual field). Stimulus contrast was set to each individual's threshold, measured in the absence of TMS. When TMS was applied over V1 performance decreased in all observers (by 1.2–8.7%) compared to accuracy levels obtained during stimulation of a control site (Cz). Crucially, accuracy levels during V1 stimulation gradually improved across blocks of 200 trials in some subjects, whereas performance remained stable during control site stimulation. In contrast, this pattern of recovery was not found in an analogous backward masking paradi...
Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
