Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-xbtfd Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-13T10:18:02.506Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Crossmodal links in spatial attention are mediated by supramodal control processes: Evidence from event-related potentials

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 June 2002

MARTIN EIMER
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, Birkbeck College, University of London, United Kingdom
JOSÉ VAN VELZEN
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, Birkbeck College, University of London, United Kingdom
Get access

Abstract

Crossmodal links in spatial attention were studied in an experiment where participants had to detect peripheral tactile or visual targets on the attended side, while ignoring all stimuli on the unattended side and in the currently irrelevant modality. Both relevant locations and relevant modalities were specified on a trial-by-trial basis by auditory precues. Spatial orienting in the cue–target interval was reflected in anterior negativities and occipital positivities contralateral to the cued side, either when vision or touch was cued as relevant. These effects resembled previously reported ERP modulations during shifts of visual attention, implicating supramodal mechanisms in the control of spatial attention and demonstrating their independence of cue modality. Early effects of spatial attention on somatosensory and visual ERPs were of equivalent size for currently relevant and irrelevant modalities. Results support the idea that crossmodal links in spatial attention are mediated by supramodal control mechanisms.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
2002 Society for Psychophysiological Research

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)