Global associations between regional gray matter volume and diverse complex cognitive functions: evidence from a...

Area of Science:

• Neuroscience
• Cognitive Psychology
• Neuroimaging

Background:

• Investigating neural underpinnings of individual differences in complex cognitive abilities (CCAs) often involves correlating regional gray matter volume (rGMV) with psychometric scores.
• Previous studies have reported inconsistent brain region correlates for the same CCA, suggesting a need for re-evaluation.

Purpose of the Study:

• To test the hypothesis that diverse CCAs are weakly associated with rGMV in widespread brain areas.
• To explore the relationship between rGMV and performance across multiple CCAs in a large sample of healthy young adults.

Main Methods:

• Utilized neuroimaging data from a large cohort (N=1336) of healthy young adults.
• Assessed associations between regional gray matter volume (rGMV) and scores on various complex cognitive ability tasks, including non-verbal reasoning, verbal working memory, Stroop interference, and spatial processing speed.
• Employed stringent statistical corrections for multiple comparisons.

Main Results:

• Better performance on most CCAs (excluding non-verbal reasoning) correlated positively with greater rGMV in widespread brain regions.
• Effect sizes for individual associations between rGMV and CCA performance were generally small.
• Findings were consistent with prior research indicating low correlations.

Conclusions:

• The weak and widespread nature of rGMV associations with CCAs may explain the heterogeneity of findings in the field.
• Lack of strong, localized correlations, coupled with rigorous statistical methods, contributes to diverse research outcomes.
• Future research should consider the subtle and distributed neural correlates of complex cognition.