What is it about?
This study challenges the long-held view that reorienting and executive control of attention are subserved by independent neural networks. We rather show that simultaneous demands in both capacities lead to increased errors and activation in the anterior insula (which then starts inhibiting the default mode network whose activity covaries with off-task thoughts). So the anterior insula seems to be a bottleneck of attentional functioning.
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Why is it important?
As it is the first study to probe the neural underpinnings of an interaction of reorienting and executive control of attention, it is crucial for theory building. Understanding the mechanisms of attention is crucial for explaining deficits in patients and for being able to improve it through targeted training.
Perspectives
This paper combines a massive amount of different analyses in a massive participant sample (N = 282) and really converges on the central point, that is, the interaction of reorienting and executive control of attention. For me it is one of the most robust findings that should therefore strongly inform attention theories.
Philipp Kanske
Technische Universitat Dresden
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Stimulus-Driven Reorienting Impairs Executive Control of Attention: Evidence for a Common Bottleneck in Anterior Insula, Cerebral Cortex, August 2016, Oxford University Press (OUP),
DOI: 10.1093/cercor/bhw225.
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