The effect of spherical projection on spin tests for brain maps

Statistical comparison between brain maps is a standard procedure in neuroimaging. Numerous inferential methods have been developed to account for the effect of spatial autocorrelation when evaluating map-to-map similarity. A popular method to generate surrogate maps with preserved spatial autocorrelation is the spin test. Here we show that a key component of the procedure-projecting brain maps to a spherical surface-distorts distance relationships between vertices. These distortions result in surrogate maps that imperfectly preserve spatial autocorrelation, yielding inflated false positive rates. We then confirm that targeted removal of individual spins with high distortion reduces false positive rates. Collectively, this work highlights the importance of accurately representing and manipulating cortical geometry when generating surrogate maps for use in map-to-map comparisons.