Attenuation of a sustained visual processing negativity after lesions that include the inferotemporal cortex.

Prior studies have identified a sustained, posteriorly distributed 'processing negativity' related to visual attention and pattern recognition processes. In the present report, we document that such a negativity is elicited in a visual word classification task, and that it is disrupted following unilateral anterior temporal lobectomy for the treatment of epilepsy. For both right- and left-sided excisions the disruption is greatest on the side of surgery. These results are interpreted within theories of visual processing which attribute a role for the inferotemporal cortex (which is affected by anterior lobectomy) in pattern recognition, and they suggest that this region plays an important role in the generation of the visual processing negativity.