Subjects were required to attend to a combination of stimulus
modality (vision or audition) and location (left or right).
Intermodal attention was measured by comparing event-related
potentials (ERPs) to visual and auditory stimuli when the modality
was relevant or irrelevant, while intramodal (spatial) attention
was measured by comparing ERPs to visual and auditory stimuli
presented at relevant and irrelevant spatial locations. Intramodal
spatial attention was expressed differently in visual and auditory
ERPs. When vision was relevant, spatial attention showed a
contralateral enhancement of posterior N1 and P2 components
and enhancement of parietal P3. When audition was relevant,
spatial attention showed a biphasic fronto-central negativity,
starting after around 100 ms. The same effects were also present
in ERPs to stimuli that were presented in the irrelevant modality.
Thus, spatial attention was not completely modality specific.
Intermodal attention effects were also expressed differently
in vision and audition. Taken together, the obtained ERP patterns
of the present study show that stimulus attributes such as modality
and location are processed differently in vision and audition.