Now or later? fMRI shows why
You're offered tickets to the Super Bowl, but you have an anniversary getaway planned for that week. Whatever your choice, two separate brain areas will battle it out.
You're offered tickets to the Super Bowl, but you have an anniversary getaway planned for that week. Whatever your choice, two separate brain areas will battle it out.
Sticking with the vacation-essentially, choosing long-term happiness over immediate gratification-will activate the brain's frontoparietal region, associated with cognitive thinking. Choosing the Super Bowl tickets will trigger the limbic system, which is associated with emotion.
Samuel McClure, Ph.D., and colleagues at Princeton University asked 14 volunteers to choose a gift certificate ranging in value from $5 to $40, with the caveat that the larger amounts would be available only weeks later (Science 2004;306[5695]:503-507).
Functional MRI showed that all decisions activated the lateral prefrontal cortex and posterior parietal cortex, both associated with abstract thinking. Longer term options, however, fueled the frontoparietal area, while short-term choices triggered the limbic system.
Emotions won out over abstract thinking when the reward was closer at hand, McClure said.
Could Ultrafast MRI Enhance Detection of Malignant Foci for Breast Cancer?
April 10th 2025In a new study involving over 120 women, nearly two-thirds of whom had a family history of breast cancer, ultrafast MRI findings revealed a 5 percent increase in malignancy risk for each second increase in the difference between lesion and background parenchymal enhancement (BPE) time to enhancement (TTE).
MRI Study Suggests Shape of White Matter Hyperintensities May Be Predictive of Cognitive Decline
April 7th 2025Emerging research demonstrated that cognitive declines in memory, executive function and processing speed domains were associated with irregular shape of periventricular/confluent white matter hyperintensities.
Can Abbreviated MRI Have an Impact in Rectal Cancer Staging?
April 4th 2025Abbreviated MRI demonstrated a 95.3 percent specificity for rectal cancer and provided strong agreement with the full MRI protocol for T staging and detection of extramural venous invasion, according to newly published research.
