Cited by 380Functional Brain Connectivity StudiesAdvanced MRI Techniques and ApplicationsAdvanced Neuroimaging Techniques and Applications

Global signal regression strengthens association between resting-state functional connectivity and behavior

Open access
Li, Jingwei, Kong, Ru, Liégeois, Raphaël, Orban, Csaba, Tan, Yanrui, Sun, Nanbo, Holmes, Avram J., Sabuncu, Mert R. +2 more·2019·NeuroImage

Published version of a preprint

Abstract

Global signal regression (GSR) is one of the most debated preprocessing strategies for resting-state functional MRI. GSR effectively removes global artifacts driven by motion and respiration, but also discards globally distributed neural information and introduces negative correlations between certain brain regions. The vast majority of previous studies have focused on the effectiveness of GSR in removing imaging artifacts, as well as its potential biases. Given the growing interest in functional connectivity fingerprinting, here we considered the utilitarian question of whether GSR strengthens or weakens associations between resting-state functional connectivity (RSFC) and multiple behavioral measures across cognition, personality and emotion. By applying the variance component model to the Brain Genomics Superstruct Project (GSP), we found that behavioral variance explained by whole-brain RSFC increased by an average of 47% across 23 behavioral measures after GSR. In the Human Connectome Project (HCP), we found that behavioral variance explained by whole-brain RSFC increased by an average of 40% across 58 behavioral measures, when GSR was applied after ICA-FIX de-noising. To ensure generalizability, we repeated our analyses using kernel regression. GSR improved behavioral prediction accuracies by an average of 64% and 12% in the GSP and HCP datasets respectively. Importantly, the results were consistent across methods. A behavioral measure with greater RSFC-explained variance (using the variance component model) also exhibited greater prediction accuracy (using kernel regression). A behavioral measure with greater improvement in behavioral variance explained after GSR (using the variance component model) also enjoyed greater improvement in prediction accuracy after GSR (using kernel regression). Furthermore, GSR appeared to benefit task performance measures more than self-reported measures. Since GSR was more effective at removing motion-related and respiratory-related artifacts, GSR-related increases in variance explained and prediction accuracies were unlikely the result of motion-related or respiratory-related artifacts. However, it is worth emphasizing that the current study focused on whole-brain RSFC, so it remains unclear whether GSR improves RSFC-behavioral associations for specific connections or networks. Overall, our results suggest that at least in the case for young healthy adults, GSR strengthens the associations between RSFC and most (although not all) behavioral measures. Code for the variance component model and ridge regression can be found here: https://github.com/ThomasYeoLab/CBIG/tree/master/stable_projects/preprocessing/Li2019_GSR.

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Crossref · 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2019.04.016

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  • NBS used two-sample t-tests (P<0.001) controlling for age, gender, and scanner, with permutation tests (N=10,000) and family-wise error correction (PFWE<0.05).

    “We utilized NBS to localize edge-level group differences in both positive and negative connectivity using two sample t tests(P<0.001), controlling for age, gender, and scanner(58).”

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Research works printed but not linked: 2

  1. Bertolero MA, Yeo BTT, Bassett DS, D’Esposito M. Strong hubs facilitate network modularity and cognitive performance. Nature Human Behavior, in press.
  2. Murphy KP. 2012 Machine Learning MIT Press.

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Authors
Li, J., Kong, R., Liégeois, R., Orban, C., Tan, Y., Sun, N., Holmes, A. J., Sabuncu, M. R., Ge, T., & Yeo, B. T. T.
Affiliations
  • National University of Singapore (SG)
  • Yale University (US)
  • Cornell University (US)
  • Massachusetts General Hospital (US)
Corresponding author
Yeo, B.T. Thomas
Venue
NeuroImage
Publisher
Elsevier BV
Published
2019-08
Volume
196
Pages
126-141
ISSN
1053-8119 (ISSN-L)
OpenAlex
W2953136735
Cited by
380
References
108
Citations by year
2026: 44 · 2025: 59 · 2024: 55 · 2023: 48 · 2022: 54 · 2021: 52 · 2020: 47 · 2019: 19 · 2018: 1
FWCI
24.82
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Locations
  • NeuroImage (acceptedVersion)
  • bioRxiv (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory) (acceptedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
Funders
  • National Medical Research Council (CBRG/0088/2015)
  • National University of Singapore (R185000271720, DPRT/944/09/14)
  • NIH Blueprint for Neuroscience Research
  • Harvard University
  • Massachusetts General Hospital
  • National Research Foundation Singapore
  • Ministry of Education - Singapore (MOE2014-T2-2-016)
  • McDonnell Center for Systems Neuroscience
  • National Institutes of Health (K99AG054573)
Topics
  • Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Functional Brain Connectivity Studies
  • Health Sciences › Medicine › Radiology, Nuclear Medicine and Imaging › Advanced MRI Techniques and Applications
  • Health Sciences › Medicine › Radiology, Nuclear Medicine and Imaging › Advanced Neuroimaging Techniques and Applications
Keywords
global signal regression, resting-state functional connectivity, behavior prediction, variance component models, kernel regression, whole-brain connectivity, Human Connectome Project
MeSH terms
Adolescent, Adult, Brain, Brain Mapping, Cognition, Emotions, Female, Humans, Image Processing, Computer-Assisted, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Male, Neural Pathways, Personality, Signal Processing, Computer-Assisted, Artifacts, Young Adult

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