Action–based mechanisms of attention
Actions, which have effects in the external world, must be spatiotopically represented in the brain. The brain is capable of representing space in many different forms (e.g. retinotopic-, environment-, head- or shoulder-centred), but we maintain that actions are represented in action-centred space,...
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Published in | Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B. Biological sciences Vol. 353; no. 1373; pp. 1385 - 1393 |
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Main Authors | , , |
Format | Journal Article |
Language | English |
Published |
England
The Royal Society
29.08.1998
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Subjects | |
Online Access | Get full text |
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Summary: | Actions, which have effects in the external world, must be spatiotopically represented in the brain. The brain is capable of representing space in many different forms (e.g. retinotopic-, environment-, head- or shoulder-centred), but we maintain that actions are represented in action-centred space, meaning that, at the cellular level, the direction of movement is defined by the activity of cells. In reaching, for example, object location is defined as the direction and distance between the origin of the hand and the target. Most importantly, we argue that more than one task-relevant action can be evoked at any moment in time. Therefore, highly efficient selection processes that accurately link vision and action have had to evolve. Research is reviewed which supports the notion of action-based inhibitory mechanisms that select the target from competing distractors. |
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Bibliography: | Author for correspondence. istex:4038D0DC6C906EA2047A78C7FCF66AC0F6B802E7 ark:/67375/V84-LGW69FGN-V Discussion Meeting Issue 'Brain mechanisms of selective perception and action' organized by G. W. Humphreys, J. Duncan and A. Treisman ObjectType-Article-1 SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1 ObjectType-Feature-2 content type line 23 |
ISSN: | 0962-8436 1471-2970 |
DOI: | 10.1098/rstb.1998.0292 |