The topography of high-order human object areas
Abstract
Cortical topography is one of the most fundamental organizing principles of cortical areas. One such topography - eccentricity mapping - is present even in high-order, ventral stream visual areas. Within these areas, different object categories have specific eccentricity biases. In particular, faces, letters and words appear to be associated with central visual-field bias, whereas buildings are associated with a peripheral one. We propose that resolution needs are an important factor in organizing object representations: objects whose recognition depends on analysis of fine detail will be associated with central-biased representations, whereas objects whose recognition entails large-scale integration will be more peripherally biased.
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Sensitivity to increasingly larger visual units varies along a posterior-to-anterior gradient, whereas sensitivity to increasingly eccentric sectors of the retina varies along a lateral-to-mesial gradient.
“Sensitivity to increasingly larger visual units varies along a posterior-toanterior gradient, whereas sensitivity to increasingly eccentric sectors of the retina varies along a lateral-tomesialgradient.”
From The visual word form area: expertise for reading in the fusiform gyrus (2003) · cites this paper as [43]
Regions that show particular responsivity to objects, faces, or houses occupy reproducible locations within those gradients, corresponding to the differential requirements that they put on peripheral or foveal vision.
“Strikingly, the regions that show particular responsivity to objects, faces, or houses occupy reproducible locations within those gradients, corresponding to the differential requirements that they put on peripheral or foveal vision [43].”
From The visual word form area: expertise for reading in the fusiform gyrus (2003) · cites this paper as [43]
Two gradients of selectivity that cut across all areas of the ventral visual system have been identified.
“Two gradients of selectivity that cut across all areas of the ventral visual system have been identified [43].”
From The visual word form area: expertise for reading in the fusiform gyrus (2003) · cites this paper as [43]
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- Authors
- Malach, R., Levy, I., & Hasson, U.
- Affiliations
- Weizmann Institute of Science (IL)
- Hebrew University of Jerusalem (IL)
- Corresponding author
- Malach, Rafael
- Venue
- Trends in Cognitive Sciences
- Publisher
- Elsevier BV
- Published
- 2002-04
- Volume
- 6
- Issue
- 4
- Pages
- 176-184
- ISSN
- 1364-6613 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W2022251150
- Cited by
- 459
- References
- 46
- Citations by year
- 2026: 8 · 2025: 9 · 2024: 23 · 2023: 12 · 2022: 15 · 2021: 21 · 2020: 15 · 2019: 19 · 2018: 17 · 2017: 22 · 2016: 18 · 2015: 28 · 2014: 21 · 2013: 26 · 2012: 10
- FWCI
- 1.96
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Trends in Cognitive Sciences (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Funders
- James S. McDonnell Foundation
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Visual perception and processing mechanisms
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Face Recognition and Perception
- Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition › Visual Attention and Saliency Detection
- Keywords
- cortical topography, ventral stream, object recognition, face perception, visual word recognition, building recognition, visual resolution, object representation
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