Cited by 1,365Visual perception and processing mechanismsEmbodied and Extended CognitionNeural and Behavioral Psychology Studies

The DOI matches its Crossref record; 162 of the 162 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.

Attention, Uncertainty, and Free-Energy

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Feldman, Harriet, Friston, Karl J.·2010·Frontiers in Human Neuroscience

Abstract

We suggested recently that attention can be understood as inferring the level of uncertainty or precision during hierarchical perception. In this paper, we try to substantiate this claim using neuronal simulations of directed spatial attention and biased competition. These simulations assume that neuronal activity encodes a probabilistic representation of the world that optimizes free-energy in a Bayesian fashion. Because free-energy bounds surprise or the (negative) log-evidence for internal models of the world, this optimization can be regarded as evidence accumulation or (generalized) predictive coding. Crucially, both predictions about the state of the world generating sensory data and the precision of those data have to be optimized. Here, we show that if the precision depends on the states, one can explain many aspects of attention. We illustrate this in the context of the Posner paradigm, using the simulations to generate both psychophysical and electrophysiological responses. These simulated responses are consistent with attentional bias or gating, competition for attentional resources, attentional capture and associated speed-accuracy trade-offs. Furthermore, if we present both attended and non-attended stimuli simultaneously, biased competition for neuronal representation emerges as a principled and straightforward property of Bayes-optimal perception.

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Metadata

Authors
Feldman, H., & Friston, K. J.
Affiliations
Wellcome Centre for Human Neuroimaging (GB)
Corresponding author
Friston, Karl J.
Venue
Frontiers in Human Neuroscience
Published
2010
Volume
4
Pages
215-215
ISSN
1662-5161 (ISSN-L)
OpenAlex
W2096962395
Cited by
1,365
References
162
Citations by year
2026: 128 · 2025: 118 · 2024: 104 · 2023: 98 · 2022: 98 · 2021: 121 · 2020: 115 · 2019: 122 · 2018: 97 · 2017: 70 · 2016: 68 · 2015: 73 · 2014: 58 · 2013: 50 · 2012: 38
FWCI
18.37
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
cc-by
Locations
  • Frontiers in Human Neuroscience (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed Central (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
  • UCL Discovery (University College London) (submittedVersion)
Funders
Wellcome Trust (088130)
Topics
  • Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Visual perception and processing mechanisms
  • Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Embodied and Extended Cognition
  • Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Neural and Behavioral Psychology Studies
Keywords
free energy principle, Bayesian inference, uncertainty, predictive coding, evidence accumulation, biased competition, Posner paradigm, attentional capture, speed-accuracy trade-off, attentional gating, hierarchical perception, neural simulation

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