title: Dynamic Brain Network Correlates of Spontaneous Fluctuations in Attention.
abstract: Human attention is intrinsically dynamic, with focus continuously shifting between elements of the external world and internal, self-generated thoughts. Communication within and between large-scale brain networks also fluctuates spontaneously from moment to moment. However, the behavioral relevance of dynamic functional connectivity and possible link with attentional state shifts is unknown. We used a unique approach to examine whether brain network dynamics reflect spontaneous fluctuations in moment-to-moment behavioral variability, a sensitive marker of attentional state. Nineteen healthy adults were instructed to tap their finger every 600 ms while undergoing fMRI. This novel, but simple, approach allowed us to isolate moment-to-moment fluctuations in behavioral variability related to attention, independent of common confounds in cognitive tasks (e.g., stimulus changes, response inhibition). Spontaneously increasing tap variance ("out-of-the-zone" attention) was associated with increasing activation in dorsal-attention and salience network regions, whereas decreasing tap variance ("in-the-zone" attention) was marked by increasing activation of default mode network (DMN) regions. Independent of activation, tap variance representing out-of-the-zone attention was also time-locked to connectivity both within DMN and between DMN and salience network regions. These results provide novel mechanistic data on the understudied neural dynamics of everyday, moment-to-moment attentional fluctuations, elucidating the behavioral importance of spontaneous, transient coupling within and between attention-relevant networks.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA.|Department of Psychiatry, Massachusetts General Hospital, Charlestown, MA, USA.|Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging.
authors.forename: Aaron
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Kucyi
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA.|Department of Psychiatry, Massachusetts General Hospital, Charlestown, MA, USA.|Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging.
authors.forename: Michael J
authors.initials: MJ
authors.lastname: Hove
authors.affiliation: Boston Attention and Learning Laboratory and Neuroimaging Research for Veterans Center (NeRVe), Veterans Administration, Boston Healthcare System, Boston, MA, USA.|Department of Psychiatry, Boston University School of Medicine, Boston, MA, USA.
authors.forename: Michael
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Esterman
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Center for Brain Science, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA.
authors.forename: R Matthew
authors.initials: RM
authors.lastname: Hutchison
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA.|Department of Psychiatry, Massachusetts General Hospital, Charlestown, MA, USA.|Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging.
authors.forename: Eve M
authors.initials: EM
authors.lastname: Valera
mesh_terms: D001288:Attention / Q000502:physiology*; D001921:Brain / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging / Q000502:physiology*; D001931:Brain Mapping; D005260:Female; D005385:Fingers / Q000502:physiology; D006801:Humans; D007266:Inhibition, Psychological; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008297:Male; D009048:Motor Skills / Q000502:physiology*; D009434:Neural Pathways / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging / Q000502:physiology; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D012146:Rest; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: dynamic functional connectivity; insula; medial prefrontal cortex; posterior cingulate cortex; resting state fMRI