Neural Correlates of Sensation and Performance as Revealed by Neuroimaging Studies

We present and discuss evidence on how neurophysiological measures of brain activation supplied by various neuroimaging methods relate to stimulus intensity, on the one hand, and subjective experience, in particular, sensory magnitudes and measures of performance (like speed or accuracy of response), on the other. We argue that in modern neurophysiology, the functional relation between the stimulus intensity and the neural response is largely neglected in favor of research on higher-order, cognitive processing. In turn, physiological psychology has yet little to say about the relation between neural activity and the sensory magnitude. Moreover, most current work in neuroscience lacks a parametric examination along the entire line stimulus-neural activity-sensation. A deeper insight into the nature of the functional relationship between the intensity of sensation and the magnitude of nervous activity in the brain requires an interdisciplinary effort made by neurophysiology, physiological psychology and sensory