Effects of haptic integration on the representation of body parts in external space: an ERP study
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1
City University, United Kingdom
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2
University of Leipzig, Germany
Previous research has shown that limb posture modulates the spatially selective processing of attended versus unattended events on the body surface: effects of tactile attention are smaller when hands are located near each other than when they are far apart. The present study measured event-related brain potentials (ERPs) to investigate whether haptic integration across the hands affects the representation of somatosensory locations in external space. Participants placed their hands onto bars, via which tactile stimulation was delivered to their fingers, when these bars where placed near each other, far apart, or far apart but joined to each other through a connecting rod. Participants covertly oriented their attention to the left, the right or both hands by following bilaterally presented tactile cues that indicated the likely location(s) of an upcoming tactile target. Results show that, in line with previous studies, effects of tactile attention occurred earlier (somatosensory P100) when the hands were far apart, compared to when they were placed near each other. Attentional enhancements were present for tactile events at the attended hand, compared to the unattended hand, and compared to when both hands were attended, suggesting that early attentional modulations reflect facilitated somatosensory processing at attended locations rather than suppressed processing at unattended locations. Importantly, we found that joining the hands through a connecting rod reduced the attentional enhancements brought about by their spatial separation. This suggests that the representation of somatosensory locations in external space can be modulated by haptic integration at early stages of processing.
Conference:
10th International Conference on Cognitive Neuroscience, Bodrum, Türkiye, 1 Sep - 5 Sep, 2008.
Presentation Type:
Poster Presentation
Topic:
Attention
Citation:
Gillmeister
H,
Adler
J and
Forster
B
(2008). Effects of haptic integration on the representation of body parts in external space: an ERP study.
Conference Abstract:
10th International Conference on Cognitive Neuroscience.
doi: 10.3389/conf.neuro.09.2009.01.099
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Received:
02 Dec 2008;
Published Online:
02 Dec 2008.
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Correspondence:
Helge Gillmeister, City University, London, United Kingdom, hgillmeister@gmail.com