Electrical Stimulation ‘Tunes’ Visual Attention

New findings published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Science challenge scientists’ current understanding of how visual attention is focused and the roles of short and long-term memory. Researchers have long known that attention could be tuned, like a radio dial, to hone in on specific features, but how and where in the brain the so-called ‘tuning’ occurs has remained an open question. During the study, researchers passed a very weak electrical current through the brains of healthy volunteers using a process called transcranial direct-current stimulation, allowing volunteers to much more quickly find target objects embedded in arrays of distracting objects. Results of the study showed that after 20 minutes of passing safe levels of electrical current through electrodes placed on the head, the volunteers were able to more effectively focus attention on the searched-for targets, with dramatic increases in speed. “These new findings provide evidence that long-term memory representations can also underlie our ability to rapidly configure attention to focus on certain objects, and that long-term memory performance can be sharply accelerated using electrical stimulation, ” noted the lead author of the study. To read more about this study, click here.