Journal of neurophysiology
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Covert spatial attention is thought to facilitate the maintenance of locations in working memory, and EEG α-band activity (8-12 Hz) is proposed to track the focus of covert attention. Recent work has shown that multivariate patterns of α-band activity track the polar angle of remembered locations relative to fixation. However, a defining feature of covert spatial attention is that it facilitates processing in a specific region of the visual field, and prior work has not determined whether patterns of α-band activity track the two-dimensional (2-D) coordinates of remembered stimuli within a visual hemifield or are instead maximally sensitive to the polar angle of remembered locations around fixation. ⋯ These results support the hypothesis that this α-band activity is involved in the spotlight of attention, and arises from mid- to lower-level visual areas involved in maintaining spatial locations in working memory. NEW & NOTEWORTHY A substantial body of work has shown that patterns of EEG α-band activity track the angular coordinates of attended and remembered stimuli around fixation, but whether these patterns track the two-dimensional coordinates of stimuli presented within a visual hemifield remains an open question. Here, we demonstrate that α-band activity tracks the two-dimensional coordinates of remembered stimuli within a hemifield, showing that α-band activity reflects a spotlight of attention focused on locations maintained in working memory.