本課程為人類注意力認知神經科學研究的入門，課程內容介紹人類注意調控的歷程、注意的瓶頸、注意的認知心理學理論、常用的研究典範，注意對外在刺激與內在表徵的調控，以及注意運作的神經相關。希望可以讓學員對人類注意力的認知神經科學研究有初步認識。

Spatial attention enables us to focus visual processing towards specific locations or stimuli prior to the next fixation. Recent evidence has suggested that local luminance at the spatial locus of attention, saccade preparation, and working memory influences pupil size independent of global luminance levels. When bright and dark patch stimuli are presented simultaneously in the periphery, thereby producing no change in global luminance, pupil size is nonetheless smaller when the spatial locus of attention, saccade planning, or working memory overlaps with the bright, compared to the dark patch stimulus (referred to as the local luminance modulation). The midbrain superior colliculus (SC), causally linked to eye movements and attention, is likely involved in this modulation. The SC receives multisensory, cognitive, and arousal inputs from multiple cortical and subcortical areas such as the frontal eye field and locus coeruleus, and projects directly to premotor brainstem circuit to initiate the orienting response which includes pupillary responses. Research in behaving monkeys has shown that pupil size is altered according to local luminance level at the spatial location corresponding to a microstimulated location in the SC map of monkeys.