visuo-spatial attention

Susceptibility to multitasking in chronic stroke is associated to damage of the multiple demand system and leads to lateralized visuospatial deficits. A new paper discussing multitasking as a tool to unveil subtle deficits after stroke. We argue that attentional load provides a simple strategy, firmly grounded in theory, to study the gray area in which stroke can or cannot result in stark deficits. This is an opportunity to better frame the mismatch between the amount of brain damage and its consequences, in an era in which this line is becoming increasingly blurred.

Spatial attention can be magnetically attracted by behaviorally salient stimuli. This phenomenon occasionally conflicts with behavioral goals, leading to maladaptive consequences, as in the case of addiction, in which attentional biases have been described and linked with clinically meaningful variables, such as craving level or dependence intensity.

Previous studies suggest that associations between numbers and space are mediated by shifts of visuospatial attention along the horizontal axis. In this study, we investigated the effect of vertical shifts of overt attention, induced by optokinetic stimulation (OKS) and monitored through eye-tracking, in two tasks requiring explicit (number comparison) or implicit (parity judgment) processing of number magnitude.

Closer objects are invariably perceived as bigger than farther ones and are therefore easier to detect and discriminate. This is so deeply grounded in our daily experience that no question has been raised as to whether the advantage for near objects depends on other features (e.

Unilateral brain damage following stroke frequently hampers the processing of contralesional space. Whether and how it also affects the processing of stimuli appearing on the same side of the lesion is still poorly understood.

Growing evidence suggests that mental calculation might involve movements of attention along a spatial representation of numerical magnitude. Addition and subtraction on nonsymbolic numbers (numerosities) seem to induce a “momentum” effect, and have been linked to distinct patterns of neural activity in cortical regions subserving attention and eye movements.

The vestibular system has widespread connections in the central nervous system. Several activation loci following vestibular stimulations have been notably reported in deep, limbic areas that are otherwise difficult to reach and modulate in healthy subjects.

Unilateral Spatial Neglect, the most dramatic manifestation of contralesional space unawareness, is a highly heterogeneous syndrome. The presence of neglect is related to core spatially lateralized deficits, but its severity is also modulated by several domain-general factors (such as alertness or sustained attention) and by task demands.

Previous studies have shown that number processing can induce spatial biases in perception and action and can trigger the orienting of visuospatial attention. Few studies, however, have investigated how spatial processing and visuospatial attention influences number processing.

This study assessed whether numerical magnitude affects the setting of basic spatial coordinates and reference frames, namely the subjective straight ahead. Three tasks were given to 24 right-handed healthy participants: a proprioceptive and a visuo-proprioceptive task, requiring pointing to the subjective straight ahead, and a visual task, requiring a perceptual judgment about the straight ahead position of a light moving left-to-right, or right-to-left.