Abstract
The present study examined whether feature-based cueing affects early or late stages of flanker conflict processing using EEG and fMRI. Feature cues either directed participants’ attention to the upcoming colour of the target or were neutral. Validity-specific modulations during interference processing were investigated using the N200 event-related potential (ERP) component and BOLD signal differences. Additionally, both data sets were integrated using an fMRI-constrained source analysis. Finally, the results were compared with a previous study in which spatial instead of feature-based cueing was applied to an otherwise identical flanker task. Feature-based and spatial attention recruited a common fronto-parietal network during conflict processing. Irrespective of attention type (feature-based; spatial), this network responded to focussed attention (valid cueing) as well as context updating (invalid cueing), hinting at domain-general mechanisms. However, spatially and non-spatially directed attention also demonstrated domain-specific activation patterns for conflict processing that were observable in distinct EEG and fMRI data patterns as well as in the respective source analyses. Conflict-specific activity in visual brain regions was comparable between both attention types. We assume that the distinction between spatially and non-spatially directed attention types primarily applies to temporal differences (domain-specific dynamics) between signals originating in the same brain regions (domain-general localization).
Highlights
The term ‘attention’ describes the concentration of available resources on a subset of all incoming information units at a given time
Comparing the effects of different attention modes on flanker interference processing yielded a similar recruitment of fronto-parietal brain structures but distinct conflict processing mechanisms
Overlapping activity between experiments in the INC > CON contrast with valid cueing in superior parietal lobule (SPL) and putative frontal eye field (FEF) points to a general dorsal fronto-parietal network for top-down control of conflict processing
Summary
The term ‘attention’ describes the concentration of available resources on a subset of all incoming information units at a given time. Selection based on features is assumed to affect the entire visual field by initiating both neuronal enhancement of attended features and suppression of simultaneously presented ignored features[5,6] In addition to such response gain changes, a competitive interaction of stimuli simultaneously presented within a neuron’s receptive field is suggested, where attention to one stimulus enhances its response gain and simultaneously suppresses the gain of the unattended stimulus[7]. The feature integration theory represents a hierarchical model with a superior role for spatial selection This idea would imply that feature-based cueing of the correct stimulus colour does not affect early interference processing to the same extent as in our previous study using spatial cueing because all features (attended and unattended) are initially processed in parallel
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