<b>Large-scale functional overlap between dorsal and ventral object-responsive networks</b>

Although extensive evidence suggests that the two pathways interact, the extent and the strength of these interactions across whole-brain networks remain unclear. In two experiments, we characterized the whole-brain network connections of object-selective regions in each pathway using functional magnetic resonance imaging data acquired while participants viewed objects.

Here we show substantial spatial overlap in connectivity networks generated from a dorsal and a ventral seed region—with the greater similarity between object networks within an individual than each network shows across individuals. This overlap persists across tools and non-tools and even after controlling for the shared variance between pathways. Together, these findings reveal that dorsal and ventral pathways form highly overlapping and distributed networks in the service of object perception.</p>