Differential selectivity for dynamic versus static information in face-selective cortical regions
Research highlights
► The face-selective rpSTS region shows a strong preference for dynamic faces. ► The face-selective raSTS region responds to dynamic faces only. ► The rFFA and rOFA do not distinguish between dynamic and static faces.
Introduction
Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies of face perception reliably identify multiple face-selective cortical regions (Kanwisher and Yovel, 2006, Ishai, 2008, Fox et al., 2009, Pinsk et al., 2009), but the functional operations performed in these regions are not yet clearly understood. Two of the most commonly studied regions are the fusiform face area (FFA) (Kanwisher et al., 1997), found on the ventral surface of the occipitotemporal cortex, and a face-selective region in the posterior superior temporal sulcus (pSTS) (Phillips et al., 1997, Puce et al., 1998). In addition to being located in different areas of the brain, the FFA and pSTS are also thought to perform different functional roles in the perception of faces. The FFA has been implicated in the representation of static or invariant properties of faces (Kanwisher et al., 1997, McCarthy et al., 1997, Haxby et al., 2000), such as facial identity (Grill-Spector et al., 2004, Yovel and Kanwisher, 2004, Rotshtein et al., 2005), whereas the pSTS region has been implicated in the representation of the dynamic properties of faces (Allison et al., 2000, Haxby et al., 2000, Gobbini et al., in press), such as eye, mouth and head movements (Puce et al., 1998, Lee et al., 2010) and facial expression (Phillips et al., 1997, Winston et al., 2004). Fox et al. (2009) have further demonstrated that face-selective regions can be more robustly identified using dynamic stimuli compared with static stimuli (see also Hasson et al., 2010, Scherf et al., 2010). However, no prior study has directly compared the response to dynamic versus static stimuli in these and other face-selective regions using data independent of that used to define the regions of interest (Saxe et al., 2006, Vul and Kanwisher, 2011). Here we do just that, by measuring the response of each face-selective region to short movies of faces, bodies, scenes, objects and scrambled objects and to static images taken from these same movies. In addition to the widely studied FFA, occipital face area (OFA) (Gauthier et al., 2000), and pSTS regions, we also examined the response profile of face-selective regions in the posterior continuation of the STS (pcSTS), the anterior STS (aSTS) (Pinsk et al., 2009, Said et al., 2010), inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) (Ishai et al., 2002, Fox et al., 2009), and motor cortex (Adolphs, 2002, Keysers et al., 2010).
Section snippets
Participants
Fourteen individuals (all right-handed; seven females) participated in this experiment. Participants were college or graduate students in the Boston area. All were neurologically normal and were paid for their participation. Informed consent was obtained and the committee on the use of humans as experimental participants at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology approved all procedures. One male participant was discarded from further analysis after moving more than 3 mm over the course of the
Identifying ROIs
Face-selective ROIs in the right hemisphere were identified based on the data from four runs of the dynamic localizer using a contrast of dynamic faces greater than dynamic objects. The most robust ROIs across participants were found in the mid-fusiform gyrus (FFA) in 13/13 participants, in or around the inferior occipital gyrus (OFA) in 13/13 participants, at or slightly anterior to the junction of the ascending and descending limbs of the STS (posterior STS, or pSTS) in 13/13 participants,
Discussion
Extensive prior evidence has led to the hypothesis that face-selective regions in the STS preferentially represent the dynamic aspects of a face while face-selective regions in the fusiform gyrus preferentially represent the static or invariant aspects of a face (Puce et al., 1998, Allison et al., 2000, Haxby et al., 2000, Grill-Spector et al., 2004, Andrews and Ewbank, 2004). In the present study, we used fMRI to quantitatively test this claim by systematically examining how face-selective
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