Experience sampling during fMRI reveals default network and executive system contributions to mind wandering
Kalina Christoff and four colleagues use experience sampling during fMRI to measure mind-wandering during a concurrent task. In the interval before each probe, default network regions were activated during mind-wandering, and medial prefrontal default regions were active both with self-reports of wandering and with performance errors on the task. Mind-wandering was also associated with recruitment of executive network regions, as behavioural theories of off-task thought predict. Recruitment in both sets of regions was strongest when participants were unaware that their minds were wandering. The authors suggest that two systems assumed to work in opposition may cooperate during mind-wandering. This page cites the paper for the parallel activity of default and executive regions.
Kalina Christoff and four colleagues use experience sampling during fMRI to measure mind-wandering during a concurrent task. In the interval before each probe, default network regions were activated during mind-wandering, and medial prefrontal default regions were active both with self-reports of wandering and with performance errors on the task. Mind-wandering was also associated with recruitment of executive network regions, as behavioural theories of off-task thought predict. Recruitment in both sets of regions was strongest when participants were unaware that their minds were wandering. The authors suggest that two systems assumed to work in opposition may cooperate during mind-wandering. This page cites the paper for the parallel activity of default and executive regions.
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Christoff, K., Gordon, A. M., Smallwood, J., Smith, R., & Schooler, J. W. (2009). Experience sampling during fMRI reveals default network and executive system contributions to mind wandering. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 106(21), 8719-8724. doi:10.1073/pnas.0900234106