The Neuroanatomical Basis for Posterior Superior Parietal Lobule Control Lateralization of Visuospatial Attention

Abstract

The right hemispheric dominance in visuospatial attention in human brain has been well established. Converging evidence has documented that ventral posterior parietal cortex (PPC) plays an important role in visuospatial attention. The role of dorsal PPC subregions, especially the superior parietal lobule (SPL) in visuospatial attention is still controversial. In the current study, we used repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) and diffusion magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) techniques to test the role of posterior SPL in visuospatial attention and to investigate the potential neuroanatomical basis for right hemisphere dominance in visuospatial function. Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) results unraveled that the right SPL predominantly mediated visuospatial attention compared to left SPL. Anatomical connections analyses between the posterior SPL and the intrahemispheric frontal subregions and the contralateral PPC revealed that right posterior SPL has stronger anatomical connections with the ipsilateral middle frontal gyrus (MFG), with the ipsilateral inferior frontal gyrus (IFG), and with contralateral PPC than that of the left posterior SPL. Furthermore, these asymmetric anatomical connections were closely related to behavioral performances. Our findings indicate that SPL plays a crucial role in regulating visuospatial attention, and dominance of visuospatial attention results from unbalanced interactions between the bilateral fronto-parietal networks and the interhemispheric parietal network.

Functional topography of the right inferior parietal lobule structured by anatomical connectivity profiles

“…The behavioral domain and paradigm analyses of the IPL subregions revealed that Cl3 primarily participated in inhibition and attention and suggested that Cl3 in the RIPL plays a key role in attention reorientation. Our finding was supported by previous anatomical connectivity analyses, which revealed that the betweenhemispheric asymmetry of the anatomical connections of the IPL with the middle and inferior frontal gyri underlies the lateralization of visuospatial attention [Thiebaut de Schotten et al, 2011;Wu et al, 2016].…”

“…More recently, Mars et al [2012] used an anatomical connectivity-based parcellation approach to parcellate the right temporoparietal junction (TPJ) including the IPL, and found that the anterior TPJ, not the IPL that we found, primarily participated in the attention network. Our finding was supported by previous anatomical connectivity analyses, which revealed that the betweenhemispheric asymmetry of the anatomical connections of the IPL with the middle and inferior frontal gyri underlies the lateralization of visuospatial attention [Thiebaut de Schotten et al, 2011;Wu et al, 2016]. The taskbased fMRI detected the functional activation and revealed the approximately anatomical location.…”

Neurophysiological capacity in a working memory task differentiates dependent from nondependent heavy drinkers and controls

“…The sPar is part of a dorsal processing stream that is related to attention and associated with performance on experimental tasks measuring various cognitive domains, including attention and memory (Kumfor et al, 2015; Rosen et al, 2015). For example, the sPar was found to mediate visuospatial attention in a recent transcranial magnetic stimulation study (Wu et al, 2016). The mPFC, on the other hand, is part of the default-mode network and decreased activity in that network is consistent with a shift to a more attention-focused brain state (Raichle and Snyder, 2007; Wang and Li, 2013).…”

Discriminating between neurofibromatosis‐1 and typically developing children by means of multimodal MRI and multivariate analyses

“…The predominant MD abnormalities in the right hemisphere fits well with impaired visuo-spatial ability (Vogel, Bowers, & Vogel 2003;Wu et al, 2016) and social cognition (De Pisapia et al, 2014;Mitchell & Phillips, 2015). The predominant MD abnormalities in the right hemisphere fits well with impaired visuo-spatial ability (Vogel, Bowers, & Vogel 2003;Wu et al, 2016) and social cognition (De Pisapia et al, 2014;Mitchell & Phillips, 2015).…”

“…These microstructural abnormalities are in line with the cognitive phenotype of NF1 patients. The predominant MD abnormalities in the right hemisphere fits well with impaired visuo-spatial ability (Vogel, Bowers, & Vogel 2003;Wu et al, 2016) and social cognition (De Pisapia et al, 2014;Mitchell & Phillips, 2015). Impairment of the thalamus and of its projections on the visual and frontal cortex may contribute to the executive and/or the visuo-spatial deficits in NF1.…”