Imagination, Reality Flow in Opposite Directions in the Brain

Aiming to discern discrete neural circuits, researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison have tracked electrical activity in the brains of people who alternately imagined scenes or watched videos. In a study recently published in the journal NeuroImage, researchers’ developed new tools in order to help untangle what happens in the brain during sleep and dreaming, as well as to understand how the brain uses networks to encode short-term memory. During the study, researchers found that an increase in the flow of information from the parietal lobe of the brain to the occipital lobe happens during imagination. In contrast, visual information taken in by the eyes, tends to flow form the occipital lobe — which makes up much of the brain’s visual cortex — to the parietal lobe. “There seems to be a lot in our brains and animal brains that is directional, that neural signals move in a particular direction, then stop, and start somewhere else,” said one of the study’s researchers. “I think this is really a new theme that has not been explored.” To read more about this study, click here.