Cerebral mechanisms underlying orienting of attention towards auditory frequency changes

Brain mechanisms underlying detection of auditory frequency changes were studied with event-related potentials (ERPs) in 14 human subjects discriminating visual stimuli. Scalp-current density mapping revealed bilateral components of mismatch negativity (MMN) in frontal and auditory cortices. Deviance-related activations in frontal and temporal cortex began to be significant at 94 ms and 154 ms in the right hemisphere, and at 128 ms and 132 ms in the left hemisphere. The magnitude of MMN-neuroelectric currents from the left temporal cortex correlated significantly (r = −0.56, p < 0.05) with distraction caused by MMN-eliciting deviant tones. These results suggest a complex cerebral circuitry involved in frequency change detection and strongly support the role of this circuitry in driving attention involuntarily towards potentially relevant frequency changes in the acoustic environment.