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Related Experiment Video

Updated: Sep 11, 2025

Simultaneous Transcranial Alternating Current Stimulation and Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging

Simultaneous Transcranial Alternating Current Stimulation and Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging

Published on: June 5, 2017

Consistent activation differences versus differences in consistent activation: Evaluating meta-analytic contrasts.

Vincent Küppers^1,2, Edna C Cieslik^1,3, Lennart Frahm^1,4

¹Institute of Neuroscience and Medicine, Brain and Behaviour (INM-7), Research Center Jülich, Jülich, Germany.

Imaging Neuroscience (Cambridge, Mass.)

|August 13, 2025

Summary

This summary is machine-generated.

Meta-analytic contrasts in neuroimaging yield sparser, yet valid, results compared to standard meta-analyses. While capturing similar brain regions, they may miss some activations, especially in overlapping areas.

Keywords:

activation likelihood estimation method evaluation neuroimaging meta-analysis replicability research synthesis robust comparisons

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Transferring Cognitive Tasks Between Brain Imaging Modalities: Implications for Task Design and Results Interpretation in fMRI Studies

Transferring Cognitive Tasks Between Brain Imaging Modalities: Implications for Task Design and Results Interpretation in fMRI Studies

Published on: September 22, 2014

Area of Science:

Neuroimaging research
Cognitive neuroscience
Brain mapping

Background:

Coordinate-based meta-analyses enable statistical comparisons between neuroimaging results.
Meta-analytic contrasts are emerging tools for comparing distinct meta-analytic findings.
The relationship between meta-analytic contrasts and traditional meta-analyses requires empirical investigation.

Purpose of the Study:

To empirically investigate the relationship between meta-analytic contrasts and standard meta-analyses in neuroimaging.
To compare brain regions identified by both methods across diverse cognitive domains.
To assess the validity and limitations of meta-analytic contrasts.

Main Methods:

Utilized four neuroimaging datasets from working memory, cognitive interference, and emotional processing domains.
Compared results from standard meta-analyses of experiment-level contrasts (Condition A > Condition B) with meta-analytic contrasts (Meta-analysis A > Meta-analysis B).
Analyzed spatial activation patterns and the number of identified brain regions for both approaches.

Main Results:

Meta-analytic contrasts identified similar brain regions as standard meta-analyses but with distinct spatial patterns.
Fewer brain regions were detected using meta-analytic contrasts, particularly in areas with overlapping activations.
One dataset revealed additional regions in meta-analytic contrasts, possibly due to task-specific effects.

Conclusions:

Meta-analytic contrasts offer a valid but sparser representation of brain activity compared to standard meta-analyses.
These contrasts are not a direct substitute for classic meta-analyses due to potential differences in identified regions.
Further research is needed to understand the conditions under which meta-analytic contrasts and standard meta-analyses agree.