Individual face- and house-related eye movement patterns distinctively activate FFA and PPA

Abstract

We investigated if the fusiform face area (FFA) and the parahippocampal place area (PPA) contain a representation of fixation sequences that are typically used when looking at faces or houses. Here, we instructed observers to follow a dot presented on a uniform background. The dot’s movements represented gaze paths acquired separately from observers looking at face or house pictures. Even when gaze dispersion differences were controlled, face- and house-associated gaze patterns could be discriminated by fMRI multivariate pattern analysis in FFA and PPA, more so for the current observer’s own gazes than for another observer’s gaze. The discrimination of the observer’s own gaze patterns was not observed in early visual areas (V1 – V4) or superior parietal lobule and frontal eye fields. These findings indicate a link between perception and action—the complex gaze patterns that are used to explore faces and houses—in the FFA and PPA.

Abstract

The fusiform face area and parahippocampal place area respond to face and scene stimuli respectively. Here, the authors show using fMRI that these brain areas are also preferentially activated by eye movements associated with looking at faces and scenes even when no images are shown.