Hemispheric asymmetries in the neglect syndrome: a computational study

One of the most controversial aspects of hemispatial neglect is its asymmetric nature. According to most theories of neglect, this asymmetry would depend on asymmetrical representations of space in the left and right hemisphere, although there is little agreement on their exact nature and their functional meaning. In the present paper, we show a series of neural networks simulations which implement different theories of neglect to verify their neuropsychological plausibility. The results show that asymmetries are best explained by a right hemispheric dominance for spatial representations, expressed in terms of a higher number of neurons involved in spatial tasks.