iScience
June 19, 2026
Chuang Liang, Wenhao Jiang, Jiayu Chen et al.
Hemodialysis (HD) is the predominant treatment for end-stage renal disease (ESRD). Despite the efficacy of HD, the neurobiological underpinnings underlying high-risk complications remain unclear. In this study, using unsupervised fusion of functional and structural MRI, we identified a longitudinally altered default mode network (DMN)-insula pattern in ESRD receiving HD over 1-year follow-up (n...
Brain Topography
June 17, 2026
Emilio Sanz-Morales, Helena Melero
The Default Mode Network was a key finding for cognitive neuroscience, but being the result of a data-driven analysis of resting-state fMRI data, its psychological and clinical implications have been difficult to elucidate. This is because in the resting-state paradigm we cannot directly correlate an observable specific task with specific brain connectivity patterns, and therefore inferences...
Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience
June 16, 2026
Isaac R Christian, Samuel A Nastase
Humans spend considerable time contemplating the minds of others. But this ability is not limited to external agents-we also turn the lens for reading minds inward, reflecting on our own thoughts, emotions, and sense of self. Some processes involved in reasoning about minds may rely on shared mechanisms, while others may be specific to the agent under consideration. We developed a paradigm...
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
June 16, 2026
Adam R Pines, Xue Zhang, John Kochalka et al.
Psychedelic drugs are poised to become mainstream treatments, yet we lack a circuit-level account of how they reshape brain activity. Emerging evidence suggests that multiple psychedelic compounds modulate activity in the brain's default mode network (DMN), often interpreted as either increased or decreased bottom-up hierarchical processing. Most imaging studies, however, quantify activity as...
Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience
June 9, 2026
Grace Qiyuan Miao, Ian J. Lieberman, Ashley L. Binnquist et al.
Little is known about the neurocognitive underpinnings of forming social connections. In this study, we tested whether default mode network (DMN) inter-brain synchrony (which prior work has linked to interpersonal alignment, or 'seeing eye-to-eye') predicts feelings of connection during conversations. Seventy pairs of strangers engaged in shallow or deep conversations while brain activity was...
Biological Psychology
June 3, 2026
Hongkeun Kim
Functional neuroimaging studies consistently show that episodic recollection engages the default mode network (DMN), yet the extent to which this engagement varies with the representational content of retrieved information remains unclear. The present meta-analysis examined whether recollection of verbal and visual materials differentially recruits the DMN. Twenty-four verbal and 19 visual...
Cognitive Semiotics
June 2, 2026
Francesco Verde
Abstract Investigating the semantic specificity of inner speech means addressing one of the most elusive and underexplored sides of language studies: the irreducible mark of subjectivity, long marginalised in 19th- and 20th-century comparative and structuralist approaches as a non-formalisable residue of analysis (Bergounioux. 2010. Les trois sources de la théorie de l’endophasie: phonologie,...
Current Opinion in Behavioral Sciences
June 1, 2026
David V Smith, Dominic S. Fareri, Ekaterina Dobryakova
The default mode network (DMN) has been central to cognitive neuroscience research for over two decades, yet understanding of its contribution to decision-making remains incomplete. This review synthesizes recent evidence demonstrating that the DMN directly supports subjective valuation and value-based decision-making. Anatomically and functionally, core DMN regions-including the ventromedial...
Psychodynamic psychiatry
June 1, 2026
Richard Brockman
When Freud invented/discovered psychoanalysis, he devised not just a theory of mind but also a tool that enabled him to observe the "mind." And with the tool of psychoanalysis, he was able to observe the workings of the default mode network (DMN) some hundred years before anyone knew of its existence. Since then, various operations of the DMN have been identified. One is the integration of...
Journal of Visualized Experiments
May 29, 2026
Tommi Kiiso, Paula Partanen, Keyrstin Jacobs et al.
The default mode network (DMN) is a central, large-scale brain network implicated in a range of cognitive functions and neuropsychiatric disorders, such as major depressive disorder (MDD). Studying the DMN's complex dynamics in animal models provides invaluable insights into its function in both healthy and pathological states. However, performing stable, long-term, large-scale...