Mapping patterns of thought onto brain activity during movie-watching
Movie-watching is a central aspect of our lives and an important paradigm for understanding the brain mechanisms behind cognition as it occurs in daily life. Contemporary views of ongoing thought argue that the ability to make sense of events in the ‘here and now’ depend on the neural processing of...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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eLife Sciences Publications Ltd
2025-01-01
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| Online Access: | https://elifesciences.org/articles/97731 |
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| author | Raven Star Wallace Bronte Mckeown Ian Goodall-Halliwell Louis Chitiz Philippe Forest Theodoros Karapanagiotidis Bridget Mulholland Adam Turnbull Tamara Vanderwal Samyogita Hardikar Tirso RJ Gonzalez Alam Boris C Bernhardt Hao-Ting Wang Will Strawson Michael Milham Ting Xu Daniel S Margulies Giulia L Poerio Elizabeth Jefferies Jeremy I Skipper Jeffrey D Wammes Robert Leech Jonathan Smallwood |
| author_facet | Raven Star Wallace Bronte Mckeown Ian Goodall-Halliwell Louis Chitiz Philippe Forest Theodoros Karapanagiotidis Bridget Mulholland Adam Turnbull Tamara Vanderwal Samyogita Hardikar Tirso RJ Gonzalez Alam Boris C Bernhardt Hao-Ting Wang Will Strawson Michael Milham Ting Xu Daniel S Margulies Giulia L Poerio Elizabeth Jefferies Jeremy I Skipper Jeffrey D Wammes Robert Leech Jonathan Smallwood |
| author_sort | Raven Star Wallace |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Movie-watching is a central aspect of our lives and an important paradigm for understanding the brain mechanisms behind cognition as it occurs in daily life. Contemporary views of ongoing thought argue that the ability to make sense of events in the ‘here and now’ depend on the neural processing of incoming sensory information by auditory and visual cortex, which are kept in check by systems in association cortex. However, we currently lack an understanding of how patterns of ongoing thoughts map onto the different brain systems when we watch a film, partly because methods of sampling experience disrupt the dynamics of brain activity and the experience of movie-watching. Our study established a novel method for mapping thought patterns onto the brain activity that occurs at different moments of a film, which does not disrupt the time course of brain activity or the movie-watching experience. We found moments when experience sampling highlighted engagement with multi-sensory features of the film or highlighted thoughts with episodic features, regions of sensory cortex were more active and subsequent memory for events in the movie was better—on the other hand, periods of intrusive distraction emerged when activity in regions of association cortex within the frontoparietal system was reduced. These results highlight the critical role sensory systems play in the multi-modal experience of movie-watching and provide evidence for the role of association cortex in reducing distraction when we watch films. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-c25dc7f82d7c4c3d91663cd7ee810b4f |
| institution | DOAJ |
| issn | 2050-084X |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2025-01-01 |
| publisher | eLife Sciences Publications Ltd |
| record_format | Article |
| series | eLife |
| spelling | doaj-art-c25dc7f82d7c4c3d91663cd7ee810b4f2025-08-20T03:16:28ZengeLife Sciences Publications LtdeLife2050-084X2025-01-011310.7554/eLife.97731Mapping patterns of thought onto brain activity during movie-watchingRaven Star Wallace0https://orcid.org/0009-0003-0414-0254Bronte Mckeown1Ian Goodall-Halliwell2Louis Chitiz3Philippe Forest4Theodoros Karapanagiotidis5Bridget Mulholland6Adam Turnbull7Tamara Vanderwal8Samyogita Hardikar9https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4380-5055Tirso RJ Gonzalez Alam10https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4510-2441Boris C Bernhardt11https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9256-6041Hao-Ting Wang12Will Strawson13Michael Milham14Ting Xu15Daniel S Margulies16Giulia L Poerio17Elizabeth Jefferies18Jeremy I Skipper19https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5503-764XJeffrey D Wammes20https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8923-5441Robert Leech21https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5801-6318Jonathan Smallwood22https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7298-2459Department of Psychology, Queen's University, Kingston, CanadaDepartment of Psychology, Queen's University, Kingston, CanadaDepartment of Psychology, Queen's University, Kingston, CanadaDepartment of Psychology, Queen's University, Kingston, CanadaMathematical and Electrical Engineering Department, IMT Atlantique, Brest, FranceSchool of Psychology, University of Sussex, Brighton, United KingdomDepartment of Psychology, Queen's University, Kingston, CanadaDepartment of Psychology, Stanford University, Stanford, United StatesFaculty of Medicine, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, CanadaDepartment of Neurology, Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany; Max Planck School of Cognition, Leipzig, GermanySchool of Psychology and Sport Science, Bangor University, Gwynedd, United KingdomMontreal Neurological Institute-Hospital, McGill University, Montreal, CanadaCentre de Recherche de l'Institut Universitaire de Geriatrie de Montreal, Montreal, CanadaSchool of Psychology, University of Sussex, Brighton, United KingdomChild Mind Institute, New York, United StatesChild Mind Institute, New York, United StatesIntegrative Neuroscience and Cognition Center, University of Paris, Paris, FranceSchool of Psychology, University of Sussex, Brighton, United KingdomDivision of Psychology & Language Sciences, University College London, London, United KingdomInstitute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience, University College London, London, United KingdomDepartment of Psychology, Queen's University, Kingston, CanadaDepartment of Neuroimaging at the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience, King's College London, London, United KingdomDepartment of Psychology, Queen's University, Kingston, CanadaMovie-watching is a central aspect of our lives and an important paradigm for understanding the brain mechanisms behind cognition as it occurs in daily life. Contemporary views of ongoing thought argue that the ability to make sense of events in the ‘here and now’ depend on the neural processing of incoming sensory information by auditory and visual cortex, which are kept in check by systems in association cortex. However, we currently lack an understanding of how patterns of ongoing thoughts map onto the different brain systems when we watch a film, partly because methods of sampling experience disrupt the dynamics of brain activity and the experience of movie-watching. Our study established a novel method for mapping thought patterns onto the brain activity that occurs at different moments of a film, which does not disrupt the time course of brain activity or the movie-watching experience. We found moments when experience sampling highlighted engagement with multi-sensory features of the film or highlighted thoughts with episodic features, regions of sensory cortex were more active and subsequent memory for events in the movie was better—on the other hand, periods of intrusive distraction emerged when activity in regions of association cortex within the frontoparietal system was reduced. These results highlight the critical role sensory systems play in the multi-modal experience of movie-watching and provide evidence for the role of association cortex in reducing distraction when we watch films.https://elifesciences.org/articles/97731experience samplingfMRInaturalistic stimuli |
| spellingShingle | Raven Star Wallace Bronte Mckeown Ian Goodall-Halliwell Louis Chitiz Philippe Forest Theodoros Karapanagiotidis Bridget Mulholland Adam Turnbull Tamara Vanderwal Samyogita Hardikar Tirso RJ Gonzalez Alam Boris C Bernhardt Hao-Ting Wang Will Strawson Michael Milham Ting Xu Daniel S Margulies Giulia L Poerio Elizabeth Jefferies Jeremy I Skipper Jeffrey D Wammes Robert Leech Jonathan Smallwood Mapping patterns of thought onto brain activity during movie-watching eLife experience sampling fMRI naturalistic stimuli |
| title | Mapping patterns of thought onto brain activity during movie-watching |
| title_full | Mapping patterns of thought onto brain activity during movie-watching |
| title_fullStr | Mapping patterns of thought onto brain activity during movie-watching |
| title_full_unstemmed | Mapping patterns of thought onto brain activity during movie-watching |
| title_short | Mapping patterns of thought onto brain activity during movie-watching |
| title_sort | mapping patterns of thought onto brain activity during movie watching |
| topic | experience sampling fMRI naturalistic stimuli |
| url | https://elifesciences.org/articles/97731 |
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