Sensory Gating

Sensory gating describes neurological processes of filtering out redundant or unnecessary stimuli in the brain from all possible environmental stimuli. Also referred to as gating or filtering, sensory gating prevents an overload of irrelevant information in the higher cortical centers of the brain. The pulvinar nuclei of the thalamus play a major role in attention, and filter out unnecessary information. Although sensory gating is largely automatic, it also occurs within the context of attentional processes. Though the term sensory gating has been used interchangeably with sensorimotor gating, the two are distinct constructs.

The cocktail party effect illustrates how the brain inhibits input from environmental stimuli, while still processing sensory input from the attended stimulus. The cocktail party effect demonstrates sensory gating in hearing, but the other senses also go through the same process protecting primary cortical areas from being overwhelmed.