Schedule of Events | Symposia

Examining the neural bases of spontaneous mental experiences with real-time fMRI

Poster Session B - Sunday, March 30, 2025, 8:00 – 10:00 am EDT, Back Bay Ballroom/Republic Ballroom
Also presenting in Data Blitz Session 4 - Saturday, March 29, 2025, 10:30 am – 12:00 pm EDT, Constitution B.

Tiara Bounyarith¹ (tb3344@drexel.edu), David Braun¹, Aaron Kucyi¹; ¹Drexel University

There is growing scientific interest in understanding how the brain spontaneously generates unprompted, inner mental experiences. The neural representation of mind-wandering has typically been studied using random-onset experience sampling during functional neuroimaging. However, random sampling imprecisely estimates brain activity as it is not tied to the onset of mind-wandering events. To address this limitation, we developed a method, real-time fMRI-triggered experience sampling (rt-fMRI-ES), in which thought probes are triggered based on real-time estimates of spontaneous blood-oxygenation-level-dependent (BOLD) activity. In our ongoing peer-reviewed pre-registered study, rt-fMRI-ES targeted BOLD activation in two typically-anticorrelated regions: (1) the dorsal anterior insular cortex (daIC), which is theorized to underlie subjective arousal, and (2) the posteromedial cortex (PMC), implicated in domain-general stimulus-independent thought. By targeting typically-anticorrelated regions, we could potentially validate the rt-fMRI-ES technique’s ability to capture neural events that are separately time-locked to distinct mental experiences. In our current sample (n=29 of our target 60), we aimed to preliminarily test (H1) whether ratings of subjective arousal time-locked to daIC-triggered thought probes were higher than ratings not time-locked to daIC-activation, and (H2) if ratings of externally-focused attention time-locked to PMC-triggered thought probes were lower than ratings not time-locked to PMC-activation. On average, arousal was higher during daIC-activation trials compared to non-daIC-activation trials, but this relationship did not reach significance (p=0.25). There was no difference between attention ratings during PMC-activation trials versus non-PMC-activation trials (p=0.63). Support for our hypotheses after applying more rigorous statistical models once data collection has been completed could potentially validate the rt-fMRI-ES method.

Topic Area: THINKING: Other