© Annchen KnodtBrain scans showing MRI mapping for 3 tasks across 2 different days. Warm colors show the consistency of activation levels across a group of people. Cool colors represent how poorly unique patterns of activity can be reliably measured.
Hundreds of published studies over the last decade have claimed it's possible to predict an individual's patterns of thoughts and feelings by scanning their brain in an MRI machine as they perform some mental tasks.
But a new analysis
by some of the researchers who have done the most work in this area finds that those measurements are
highly suspect when it comes to drawing conclusions about any individual person's brain.
Watching the brain through a functional MRI machine (fMRI) is still great for finding the
general brain structures involved in a given task across a group of people, said Ahmad Hariri, a professor of psychology and neuroscience at Duke University who led the reanalysis.
"Scanning 50 people is going to accurately reveal what parts of the brain,
on average, are more active during a mental task, like counting or remembering names," Hariri said
Functional MRI measures blood flow as a proxy for brain activity. It shows where blood is being sent in the brain, presumably because neurons in that area are more active during a mental task.
The problem is that
the level of activity for any given person probably won't be the same twice, and a measure that changes every time it is collected
cannot be applied to predict anyone's future mental health or behavior.
Hariri and his colleagues reexamined 56 published papers based on fMRI data to gauge their reliability across 90 experiments. Hariri said the researchers recognized that "the correlation between one scan and a second is not even fair, it's poor."
They also examined data from the brain-scanning Human Connectome Project -- "Our field's Bible at the moment," Hariri called it -- and looked at test/retest results for 45 individuals.
For six out of seven measures of brain function, the correlation between tests taken about four months apart with the same person was weak. The seventh measure studied, language processing, was only a fair correlation, not good or excellent.Finally they looked at data they collected through the Dunedin Multidisciplinary Health and Development Study in New Zealand, in which 20 individuals were put through task-based fMRI twice, two or three months apart. Again, they found poor correlation from one test to the next in an individual.
The bottom line is that task-based fMRI in its current form can't tell you what an individual's brain activation will look like from one test to the next, Hariri said. The new analysis, appears June 3 in
Psychological Science"This is more relevant to my work than just about anyone else's!" Hariri said, his voice rising. "This is my fault. I'm going to throw myself under the bus.
This whole sub-branch of fMRI could go extinct if we can't address this critical limitation."
Hariri has been using fMRI data as part of a long-term study of 1,300 undergraduate Duke students. By combining brain scans, genetic testing and psychological assessments, Hariri is searching for biomarkers of individual differences in the way people process thoughts and emotions, such as why one person comes away from a traumatic event with PTSD or depression and another does not.
"We can't continue with the same old 'hot spot' research," Hariri said. "We could scan the same 1,300 undergrads again and we wouldn't see the same patterns for each of them."
One possible solution to the reliability problem, using existing technology, would be to collect data for a full hour or longer in the scanner, not just five minutes. Hariri also said developing new tasks from the ground up with the explicit purpose of reliably measuring individual differences in brain activity is another strategy. In the meanwhile, Hariri and his team have shifted their focus to MRI measures of brain structure, which are highly reliable.
"It's not as if we haven't known these issues of reliability, but this paper brings them together more sharply," said Russell Poldrack, the Albert Ray Lang Professor of Psychology at Stanford University, who had a 15-year-old fMRI paper among those that were reanalyzed.
"This is a good wakeup call, and it's a marker of Ahmad's integrity that he's taking this on," said Poldrack, who was not involved in the meta-analysis but said he has had suspicions about fMRI reliability for a few years now.
Connectivity mapping - seeing how areas of the brain are connected to address a task more than just what areas are active - is going to be the way forward, Poldrack predicted. Hariri agreed that identifying patterns of activity throughout the brain rather than in one or two areas may improve reliability.
In the meantime, the sociology behind a dramatic debunking of a scientific tool is going to be interesting to watch, Hariri and Poldrack both said.
"There's three things you can do," Poldrack said.
"You can just up and quit, you can stick your head in the sand (and act as if nothing has changed), or you can dig in and try to solve the problems."This analysis was supported by the U.S. National Science Foundation. The Dunedin Study is supported by the U.S. National Institute on Aging (R01AG049789, R01AG032282) and the UK Medical Research Council (P005918), the New Zealand Health Research Council and the New Zealand Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE). The Human Connectome Project is supported by 16 centers of the U.S. National Institutes of Health via the Blueprint for Neuroscience Research.
CITATION: "What is the Test-Retest Reliability of Common Task-fMRI Measure? New Empirical Evidence and a Meta-Analysis," Maxwell L. Elliott, Annchen R. Knodt, David Ireland, Meriwether L. Morris, Richie Poulton, Sandhya Ramrakha, Maria L. Sison, Terrie E. Moffitt, Avshalom Caspi, Ahmad R. Hariri. Psychological Science, June 3, 2020. DOI: 10.1177/0956797620916786
Reader Comments
I thought that invite was for you?
The thread was becoming deeply personal to you both.
🤫
Between the different readings taken is hundreds of thousands of miles and many different moments of time. I suspect that this differential is reflected in the change in pathway used by the brain for the exact same test (such that the brain has changed and is using different tools).
RC
This "clean slate" is the pet theory of the neuro- and behavioral scientists working at the behest of TPTB. The assumption is, with just the right methods and drugs, you can mold and shape a child to anything you want.
We can wake up the spirits of our ancestors (for example through meditation, eating or drinking). Some things we consume are stronger than others - alcohol can be so potent that it can open the doorway. My hypothesis is that foods or liquids that have been confined to mature before consumption are the strongest ‘genies in the bottle’.
The Idea of using methods and drugs to mold and shape a child is a heinous crime. Sounds like a robot factory.
Distinguish the soul, which I think is the accumulation of life credits - the energy that feeds our eternal spirit.
I can’t identify at all with what you say about the ancestral spirit being the observer. I know it happens in some families where spirits from previous generations over cloak the child. This is not desirable.
The more injury free I am the more free I am to choose any knowledge and create freely my life journey. Holding onto the injuries interfere with my life journey.
This is hard to do in short bites. We could talk for days I think.
Can you even begin to imagine how desolate and dejected God might feel listening endlessly to every complaint?
The more I search the clearer the signature becomes.
But if you are interested, search for "clean slate" + "psychology". Another deep and dirty rabbit hole. Lobotomy and electro shocks are just two of their cruel methods to experiment with humans. Mostly asylum inmates were used for the former, and disabled war veterans (of WWI) for the latter. BTW, the scientology founder Hubbard played an inglorious role in that story, too-
Jolie.. yes! In-Jury
in conflict with the oath, the sworn oath
Oh... and how do we know our conflicts by looking at our body... and watching how it operates.
Jolie.. i'm dealing with kidney signals for a couple of months... fasting now for a month and still not better. There is no reason for it other than a whole lot of planets bumping around in my 6th House (Health for the last few).. but still! I realized this morning... ahhhhh!!! My SmartPhone always rests against my reflex kidney areas!!!!! Been using it alot more last few months... and I always feel the heat in my hands...
Suggest looking up what Louise Hays says about kidneys. I recall that UTI is about being pissed off about something. Kidneys could be associated. I have to run. Will check in later. Girlfriend having birthday. Going swimming and Indian lunch then cake - chocolate salted caramel slice. Vegan style but still not good for kidneys. Lots of love.
If you look closely, despite all of the footprints on the beach, you can see the 'U' shaped track that mama turtle made. She came in from ~ ENE and after she buried her nest, departed to the ESE and into the ocean.
Just for fun and positive things.
R.C.
ENJOY!! Keep the Indian for moi
(BB germen ndn ¿como yo? )
2 eclipses down 1 more to go for you. Any newness in your life yet🤔
Loved the movie The Last Song. Nicholas Sparks soap opera with Miley Cyrus and Liam Hemsworth. It was shot in USA at Tybee Island Georgia. and there were turtles. Beautiful. <3
The Indian was great. - non left.
Only got love for you. <3
I one time sat just downwind of a HUGE leatherback turtle right as she came onshore. She was about 7-8 feet long! We sat while she dug her nest, laid her eggs, buried them, and back into the water. Cool time.
R.C.
*Ever heard of or seen a Sargasso seaweed fish? You usually only see them offshore in floating rafts of it. They walk around on the seaweed. [Link] If you take a big lump of that and throw it in a big 5 gal. bucket, there will usally be two or three in it. If you shake them out of the seaweed and leave them in the bucket without it, when you look next - two or three were there? it doesn't matter - there will only be one left, plus some fins on the bottom. "Nature's cruel,"Staros." The Thin Red Line, (film only, as I recall.)
RC
Thanks RC. You are special.
I dont tolerate any if it... No vinegar NO salt
My kidneys just exhausted... finished a10-year IRONWoman in December... now i finally rest... the smartphone's emf really gets to me.
That was just too funny PICKLING
Greatest storyteller...purest soul... 🐢🐢🐢🐢GodFather
... tks for your comment above. 🎯🤽♀️
No Indian😭💃
Having been deeper in Persinger, Koren & Co. some while ago (and knowing about their sponsors), one can see where this research is heading - automatic mind-reading by machines. And the reverse action, automated mind control.
Sometimes, diversity is our strength...