SCIENCE IN THE NEWS DAILY
Brain Scans "Read Minds" With Surprising Accuracy
from National Geographic News
Could MRI someday stand for Mind Reading Imagery? Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) technology can tell what people are thinking with startling accuracy, a new study found. Volunteers were shown two different patterns, then asked to picture one or the other.
Using fMRI brain scans, the researchers predicted—at better than 80 percent—which of the two patterns each person was actively holding in memory 11 seconds later. By measuring blood flow, fMRI images reveal which groups of neurons are active.
Some of the visual cortex's neurons are associated more with vertical visual patterns, and others with horizontal or angled patterns, explained neuroscientist Frank Tong of Vanderbilt University, who led the study. That distinction allowed the team to predict which pattern volunteers had in mind, even well after the images were removed from the screen.
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