Integrating neuronal coding into cognitive models: Predicting reaction time distributions

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

Neurophysiological studies have examined many aspects of neuronal activity in terms of neuronal codes and postulated roles for these codes in brain processing. There has been relatively little work, however, examining the relationship between different neuronal codes and the behavioural phenomena associated with cognitive processes. Here, predictions about reaction time distributions derived from an accumulator model incorporating known neurophysiological data in temporal lobe visual areas of the macaque are examined. Results from human experimental studies examining the effects of changing stimulus orientation, size and contrast are consistent with the model, including qualitatively different changes in reaction time distributions with different stimulus manipulations. The different changes in reaction time distributions depend on whether the image manipulation changes neuronal response latency or magnitude and can be related to parallel or serial cognitive processes respectively. The results indicate that neuronal coding can be productively incorporated into computational models to provide mechanistic accounts of behavioural results related to cognitive phenomena.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)377-400
Number of pages24
JournalNetwork: Computation in Neural Systems
Volume16
Issue number4
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Dec 2005

Keywords

  • neurophysiological model
  • reaction time
  • dual task
  • mental rotation
  • VISUAL INFORMATION ACQUISITION
  • TEMPORAL POLYSENSORY AREA
  • DUAL-TASK INTERFERENCE
  • MENTAL ROTATION
  • OBJECT RECOGNITION
  • 3-DIMENSIONAL OBJECTS
  • MACAQUE MONKEY
  • EYE-MOVEMENTS
  • ORIENTATION DISCRIMINATION
  • INFEROTEMPORAL CORTEX

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