Involvement of the dorsal and ventral attention networks in oddball stimulus processing: A meta‐analysis

Kim, Hongkeun · 2013 · OpenAlex-citations

DOI: 10.1002/hbm.22326

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Summary

This meta-analysis investigates the neural mechanisms underlying "oddball effects," defined as enhanced neural responses to rare, deviant stimuli presented within a stream of frequent, standard stimuli. The study aims to determine how these effects relate to the dorsal and ventral frontoparietal attention networks, a model proposing that the dorsal network supports goal-directed attentional orienting while the ventral network detects salient environmental changes. The research was motivated by the need to synthesize widespread, often inconsistent neuroimaging findings into a coherent, network-based framework, moving beyond localized brain area identification. The authors conducted a comprehensive meta-analysis of 75 independent functional neuroimaging studies (PET and fMRI) involving 1,415 healthy participants. Using the revised Activation Likelihood Estimation (ALE) algorithm, the study analyzed 93 contrasts comparing oddball versus standard or baseline conditions. The analysis specifically examined two variables: stimulus modality (auditory vs. visual) and task relevance (whether participants were required to detect the oddball). The study utilized a flexible template based on resting-state functional connectivity to define network boundaries, allowing for a robust comparison of activation patterns across different experimental designs. The results revealed three primary findings. First, ventral network regions, including the temporoparietal junction, anterior insula, and anterior cingulate cortex, showed strong, bilateral activation associated with oddball effects. This activation was largely common to both auditory and visual modalities, suggesting a supramodal "alerting" system. Furthermore, these regions were more strongly activated by task-relevant oddballs than task-irrelevant ones, indicating that ventral network engagement involves a dynamic interplay between stimulus saliency and internal goals. Second, the dorsal network showed a more modest association with oddball effects, with the exception of the bilateral inferior frontal junction, which was strongly activated. This suggests the inferior frontal junction plays a central role in top-down attentional control, while other dorsal regions remain engaged during both oddball and standard processing. Finally, significant oddball effects were observed outside these networks in sensory cortices and subcortical regions, including the putamen, thalamus, and cerebellum, likely reflecting early sensory modulation and subcortical alerting responses. The study concludes that the ventral attention network serves as a supramodal alerting system responsive to salient changes, modulated by task demands, while the dorsal network maintains a continuous attentional set, with the inferior frontal junction acting as a key hub for reorienting attention. These findings validate the two-network model of attention and highlight the distinct roles of dorsal and ventral systems in processing unexpected stimuli. The identification of subcortical involvement further underscores the distributed nature of alerting responses, providing a comprehensive map of brain activity during oddball stimulus processing.

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• attention selective divided