An empirical link between lateral eye movements and lateralized event-related brain potentials.

Abstract

Much recent research has been devoted to the investigation of lateral eye movements (LEMs) as an indicator of hemispheric activation. Various personality characteristics have been reported to be associated with predominant left and right looking which have been interpreted on the basis of hemispheric specialization; however, this interpretation has been challenged by others. We investigated the relationship between LEMs obtained in a paradigmatic question-asking procedure and event-related potentials (ERPs) in response to a checkerboard stimulus. Subjects were 20 right-handed young adults (11 men, 9 women). We found that left-looking subjects had a greater positive-going occipital ERP amplitude at 90-msec poststimulus on the right side than on the left; the reverse was true for right-looking subjects (F = 11.08, 1/16 df, p < 0.005).