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uchicago-computation-workshop / ed_awh

Repository for Ed Awh's presentation at the CSS Workshop (1/10/2018)
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Research significance of the alpha frequency band #29

Open AlexanderTyan opened 5 years ago

AlexanderTyan commented 5 years ago

As someone without background in neuroscience, my question is what is so special about the alpha-band frequency range as it relates to your findings? In other words, how would you explain the research significance of establishing the relationship between alpha activity and temporal dynamics of covert orienting to a non-neuroscientist?

edawh commented 5 years ago

It turns out that other frequencies dont' provide much information about internal spatial representations (at least using our specific approach with scalp electrode recordings). Our findings make a couple of kinds of positive contributions to the study of human cognition. First, we provide a method for tracking internal direction of attention without requiring a behavioral response...and the measurements are quite time-resolved and continuous...something that is very hard to achieve with behavioral responses alone.

Second, we are interested in helping to build more detailed and productive models of how the brain's hardware implements the software of the mind. Learning about which aspects of neural activity track different aspects of mental function is a small contribution to this broad effort.