Neural Correlates of Visual Feature Binding

Abstract We perceive visual objects as unified although different brain areas process different features. An attentional mechanism has been proposed to be involved with feature binding, as evidenced by observations of binding errors (i.e., illusory conjunctions) when attention is diverted. However, the neural underpinnings of this feature binding are not well understood. We examined the neural mechanisms of feature binding by recording EEG during an attentionally demanding discrimination task. Unlike prestimulus alpha oscillatory activity and early ERPs (i.e., the N1 and P1 components), the N1pc, reflecting stimulus-evoked spatial attention, was reduced for errors relative to correct responses and illusory conjunctions. However, the later sustained posterior contralateral negativity, reflecting visual short-term memory, was reduced for illusory conjunctions and errors compared with correct responses. Furthermore, binding errors were associated with distinct posterior lateralized activity during a 200- to 300-msec window. These results implicate a temporal binding window that integrates visual features after stimulus-evoked attention but before encoding into visual short-term memory.