Localizing visual discrimination processes in time and space

Previous studies of visual processing in humans using event-related potentials (ERPs) have demonstrated that task-related modulations of an early component called the "N1" wave (140-200 ms) reflect the operation of a voluntary discrimination process. Specifically, this component is larger in tasks requiring target discrimination than in tasks requiring simple detection. The present study was designed to localize this discriminative process in both time and space by means of combined magnetoencephalographic (MEG) and ERP recordings. Discriminative processing led to differential ERP and MEG activity beginning within 150 ms of stimulus onset. Source localization of the combined ERP/MEG data was performed using anatomical constraints from structural magnetic resonance images. These analyses revealed highly reliable and focused activity in regions of inferior occipital-temporal cortex. These findings indicate that the earliest measurable correlates of discriminative operations in the visual system appear as neural activity in circumscribed regions of the ventral processing stream.