User:Fnielsen/Sandbox/Right Temporoparietal Cortex Activation during Visuo-proprioceptive Conflict

Right Temporoparietal Cortex Activation during Visuo-proprioceptive Conflict is a scientific article describing a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) experiment. It was published in 2004 as

The experiment examined the brain response in connection with conflicting information from two senses: visual perception and proprioception. Eleven human research subjects were brain scanned with magnetic resonance imaging while their right index finger was moved on a mouse-like device by one of the experimenters. The position of the finger and the device was displayed to the subject as a cursor on a computer screen, but the motion of the cursor was either in correspondence with the finger motion or it was mirrored. The finger motion should provide the proprioception input to the subject while the cursor display the visual perception. When the finger and the cursor movement are mirrored the subject should experience a visuo-proprioceptive conflict.

After acquisition of the brain scans the researcher processed and analyzed the data within the so-called SPM program. It involved image warping for spatial normalization and Gaussian blurring in an attempt to correct for different brain sizes and shapes among the subjects and to be able to report results with reference to a stereotaxic atlas. The final step was statistical analysis with the general linear model and random field theory.

The brain scans with visuo-proprioceptive conflict were statistically compared to the brain scans without. From this comparison the researchers could point to three brain regions which were more active during the conflict, and these areas were reported as 3D points representing peak activity in each region.

The activation in the right temporoparietal junction is at the border between the temporal lobe and the parietal lobe of the cerebral cortex. An early human brain mapping study with positron emission tomography found that the temporoparietal area was involved in spatial attention, so when vision and proprioception mismatch there may be a conflict in allocating attention to locations in space.