Title
Unique and persistent individual patterns of brain activity across different memory retrieval tasks.
Abstract
Fourteen subjects were scanned in two fMRI sessions separated by several months. During each session, subjects performed an episodic retrieval task, a semantic retrieval task, and a working memory task. We found that 1) despite extensive intersubject variability in the pattern of activity across the whole brain, individual activity patterns were stable over time, 2) activity patterns of the same individual performing different tasks were more similar than activity patterns of different individuals performing the same task, and 3) that individual differences in decision criterion on a recognition test predicted the degree of similarity between any two individuals' patterns of brain activity, but individual differences in memory accuracy or similarity in structural anatomy did not. These results imply that the exclusive use of group maps may be ineffective in profiling the pattern of activations for a given task. This may be particularly true for a task like episodic retrieval, which is relatively strategic and can involve widely distributed specialized processes that are peripheral to the actual retrieval of stored information. Further, these processes may be differentially engaged depending on individual differences in cognitive processing and/or physiology.
Year
DOI
Venue
2009
10.1016/j.neuroimage.2009.06.033
NeuroImage
Keywords
Field
DocType
recognition psychology,memory,young adult,brain mapping,cognitive process,working memory,magnetic resonance imaging
Brain mapping,Developmental psychology,Degree of similarity,Working memory,Psychology,Cognitive psychology,Brain activity and meditation,Cognition
Journal
Volume
Issue
ISSN
48
3
1053-8119
Citations 
PageRank 
References 
6
0.68
4
Authors
6
Name
Order
Citations
PageRank
Michael B. Miller1354.76
Christa-Lynn Donovan2131.25
John D Van Horn331628.50
Elaine German460.68
Peter Sokol-Hessner560.68
George Wolford671.06