Abstract
Early fMRI studies suggested that brain areas processing self-related and other-related information were highly overlapping. Hypothesising functional localisation of the cortex, researchers have tried to locate “self-specific” and “other-specific” regions within these overlapping areas by subtracting suspected confounding signals in task-based fMRI experiments. Inspired by recent advances in whole-brain dynamic modelling, we instead explored an alternative hypothesis that similar spatial activation patterns could be associated with different processing modes in the form of different synchronisation patterns. Combining an automated synthesis of fMRI data with a presumption-free diffusion spectrum image (DSI) fibre-tracking algorithm, we isolated a network putatively composed of brain areas and white matter tracts involved in self-other processing. We sampled synchronisation patterns from the dynamical systems of this network using various combinations of physiological parameters. Our results showed that the self-other processing network, with simulated gamma-band activity, tended to stabilise at a number of distinct synchronisation patterns. This phenomenon, termed “multistability,” could serve as an alternative model in theorising the mechanism of processing self-other information.
Highlights
Parcellation schemes that segmented the brain into a few dozens to hundreds of cortical regions[13,16,17]
Spatial coordinates reported in functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies tagged by the key terms “self referential,” “mind tom,” “theory mind” and “mentalizing” were extracted from a database containing more than 10,900 fMRI studies, and a chi-square test was conducted to identify coordinates whose occurrence frequencies in the tagged studies were significantly higher than untagged studies
Supported by a wide variety of evidence, functional localisation hypothesis has long been acknowledged in the neuroscience field
Summary
Parcellation schemes that segmented the brain into a few dozens to hundreds of cortical regions[13,16,17]. The degree of fineness of these parcellation schemes might be appropriate at the whole-brain level, but probably too low to capture the network structure of more confined brain areas. Despite of these conceptual and technical issues, it was generally accepted that brain areas supporting cognitive functions were spatially segregated to some extent, and the balance between integration and segregation has become an intensely investigated topic[18]. If the tendency of shifting between multiple stable synchronisation patterns—referred to as “multistability”—can be verified in a structural brain network whose cortical regions constitute cognitive modules identified by task-based fMRI, the cognitive implication of multistability can draw more support. We hypothesised that the self-other processing network in the brain could present multistability, which engendered dynamic shifting between different information-processing modes
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