A neurodynamical model for selective visual attention using oscillators.

We present a neurodynamical model to study and simulate visual search tasks experiments. The model consists of different pools of interconnected phase oscillators. Each oscillator is described by an integrate-and-fire type equation. Visual attention appears as an emergent property of the dynamic of the system, resulting from the temporal synchronization of the pools which bind the features of the searched target. The time courses observed in the psychophysical visual search experiments can be explained within a purely parallel dynamic and without assuming priority maps and serial spotlight mechanisms, as is usually done in the standard theories. The model fits also the measured activity reported for the neural responses in inferotemporal visual cortex of monkeys performing visual search tasks.