The effects of psychiatric history and age on self-regulation of the default mode network

Up-regulation and down-regulation of the default mode network via real-time fMRI neurofeedback are negatively correlated in an initial session, meaning that people who get better at increasing default mode network activity tend to get worse at decreasing it, and vice versa. Age is linked to worse neurofeedback performance only in healthy individuals, not in those with psychiatric history. Adults with psychiatric history outperform healthy controls at up-regulating the default mode network, but this difference arises because healthy controls show no up-regulation learning. These findings come from analyzing open-access data from 136 participants (74 with psychiatric history, 62 healthy controls).

Study at a glance

Abstract

Abstract Real-time neurofeedback enables human subjects to learn to regulate their brain activity, effecting behavioral changes and improvements of psychiatric symptomatology. Neurofeedback up-regulation and down-regulation have been assumed to share common neural correlates. Neuropsychiatric pathology and aging incur suboptimal functioning of the default mode network. Despite the exponential increase in real-time neuroimaging studies, the effects of aging, pathology and the direction of regulation on neurofeedback performance remain largely unknown. Using open-access analyses and real-time fMRI data shared through the Rockland Sample Real-Time Neurofeedback project (N=136), we first modeled neurofeedback performance and learning in a group of subjects with psychiatric history (n a =74) and a healthy control group (n b =62). Subsequently, we examined the relationship between up-regulation and down-regulation learning, the relationship between age and neurofeedback performance in each group and differences in neurofeedback performance between the two groups. Results show that in an initial session of default mode network neurofeedback with real-time fMRI, up-regulation and down-regulation learning scores are negatively correlated. Moreover, age correlates negatively with default mode network neurofeedback performance, only in absence of psychiatric history. Finally, adults with psychiatric history outperform healthy controls in default mode network up-regulation. Interestingly, the performance difference is related to no up-regulation learning in controls.