Separate Coding of Different Gaze Directions in the Superior Temporal Sulcus and Inferior Parietal Lobule

By Andrew J. Calder, John D. Beaver, Joel S. Winston, R. J. Dolan, Rob Jenkins, Evelyn Eger, Richard N. Henson. 2007

276 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Summary Electrophysiological recording in the anterior superior temporal sulcus (STS) of monkeys has demonstrated separate cell populations responsive to direct and averted gaze 1, 2. Human functional imaging has demonstrated posterior STS activation in gaze processing, particularly in coding the intentions conveyed by gaze 3, 4, 5, 6, but to date has provided no evidence of dissociable coding of different gaze directions. Because the spatial resolution typical of group-based fMRI studies (∼6–10 mm) exceeds the size of cellular patches sensitive to different facial characteristics (1–4 mm in monkeys), a more sensitive technique may be required. We therefore used fMRI adaptation, which is considered to offer superior resolution [7], to investigate whether the human anterior STS contains representations of different gaze directions, as suggested by non-human primate research. Subjects viewed probe faces gazing left, directly ahead, or right. Adapting to leftward gaze produced a reduction in BOLD response to left relative to right (and direct) gaze probes in the anterior STS and inferior parietal cortex; rightward gaze adaptation produced a corresponding reduction to right gaze probes. Consistent with these findings, averted gaze in the adapted direction was misidentified as direct. Our study provides the first human evidence of dissociable neural systems for left and right gaze.

Subfields: Cognitive Neuroscience, Experimental and Cognitive Psychology

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Citations in the corpus

Theory of Mind: A Neural Prediction Problem (2013, neutral): “…(i.e., both gazing right) or the same facial expression (e.g., fearful), the STS response is reduced compared both to a nonrepeated presentation and to a repeated presentation of an irrelevant stimulus, such as a house or object (Calder et al., 2007, Ishai et al., 2004, Furl et al., 2007).”
Differential selectivity for dynamic versus static information in face-selective cortical regions (2011, unknown): “4 D. Pitcher et al. / NeuroImage xxx (2011) xxx–xxx Please cite this article as: Pitcher, D., et al., Differential selectivity for dynamic versus static information in face-selective cortical regions, NeuroImage (2011) , doi:10.1016/j.neuroimage.2011.03.”
Let's face it: It's a cortical network (2008, background): “Converging empirical evidence suggests that face perception is mediated by a distributed neural system (Sergent et al., 1992; Courtney et al., 1996; Haxby et al., 2000; Ishai et al., 2004, 2005).”
Neural bases of eye and gaze processing: the core of social cognition. (2009, unknown): “It has to be emphasized that the term STS region is general and some studies report anterior areas (e.g. Calder et al., 2007; Kingstone et al., 2004) while others report posterior ones (sometimes referred to as pSTS, see Allison et al., 2000).”
The neural dynamics of updating person impressions. (2013, background): “…with a range of social cognitive functions, including gaze processing (Wicker et al., 1998; Pelphrey et al., 2003b; Pelphrey et al., 2004b; Calder et al., 2007), imitation (Iacoboni et al., 1999; Decety et al., 2002; Leslie et al., 2004), action perception in the service of understanding…”
The eye contact effect: mechanisms and development. (2009, unknown): “This suggests that the mechanism underlying the eye contact effect is fast and occurs before the full and detailed cortical analysis of gaze direction [ 47 ] and human action [10] subserved by the STS.”
Different Neural Mechanisms within Occipitotemporal Cortex Underlie Repetition Suppression across Same and Different-Size Faces (2012, unknown): “Repetition suppression (RS) (or functional magnetic resonance imaging adaptation) refers to the reduction in blood oxygen level-dependent signal following repeated presentation of a stimulus.”
Gaze Cueing of Attention (2007, background): “This observation is also reflected in dedicated neural activity responsive to left- and rightward gaze (Calder et al., 2007).”