Proprioceptive cues modulate further processing of spatially congruent auditory information.
Poster Presentation

Stephanie Simon-Dack
Center for Visual Neuroscience, North Dakota State University

Malarie Deslauriers
Center for Visual Neuroscience, North Dakota State University

Tyler Kurtz
Center for Visual Neuroscience, North Dakota State University

Pytlik Roberta
Center for Visual Neuroscience, North Dakota State University

Cassandra Stratton
Center for Visual Neuroscience, North Dakota State University

Melissa Tarasenko
Center for Visual Neuroscience, North Dakota State University

Tatum Trautman
Center for Visual Neuroscience, North Dakota State University

Wolfgang Teder-Sälejärvi
Center for Visual Neuroscience, North Dakota State University

     Abstract ID Number: 65
     Full text: Not available
     Last modified: March 5, 2007
     Presentation date: 07/05/2007 10:00 AM in Quad Maclauren Hall
     (View Schedule)

Abstract
Previous studies on integration and interaction of auditory and somatosensory stimuli have produced mixed results. Early studies reported that multisensory facilitation requires spatial congruity between modalities, but recent evidence indicates that some facilitatory cross-modal interactions do not depend upon spatial coincidence. We investigated whether proprioceptive cues interact with auditory attention using a robust sustained-attention paradigm. A fast-paced random sequence of noise bursts was delivered by two speakers (left/right, 60˚ apart); the participant’s task was to attend to either the left or right speaker and to respond to occasional increased-bandwidth targets via a footswitch. We recorded high-density EEG (n=168) in three experimental conditions: the participants either held the speakers (Hold), reached out to the speakers (Reach), or had their hands in their lap (Lap). In the last two conditions, the auditory event-related potentials (ERPs) revealed a prominent negativity around 200 ms post-stimulus (N2 wave) over fronto-central areas, which is a reliable index of further processing of spatial stimulus features in free-field. The N2 wave was markedly attenuated in the ‘Hold’ condition, which suggests that proprioceptive cues further solidify spatial information computed by the auditory system, thereby alleviating the need for further processing of spatial coordinates solely based on auditory information.