Spatial Temporal Analysis of Multi-Subject Neuroimaging Data for Human Emotion Studies

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This interdisciplinary research project will develop new statistical methods to analyze multi-subject, stimulus-evoked functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) data collected from a psychology study of human emotion. The project will increase understanding of how human brain circuits associated with emotions function in a context that combines social support with externally generated emotional stress. Ultimately, the project will contribute knowledge of how the brain uses social support via the social regulation of emotion. This knowledge will facilitate future research in this area. The results of this research will assist clinical researchers interested in the neuropathology of many neurodevelopmental and affective disorders affecting children and adults. The project will provide the opportunity for undergraduate and graduate students (especially those from underrepresented groups) to participate in advanced statistical and multidisciplinary research involving human brain data. Project results, including scientific findings and developed software, will be made publicly available using public repositories.The statistical models and computational methods to be developed will address typical challenges in analyzing fMRI data, including massive data size, complex spatial and temporal properties, and a weak signal-to-noise ratio. The new low-rank multivariate general linear models for multi-subject, stimulus-evoked fMRI data feature the brain activity's common properties shared across different regions, subjects, and stimulus types, and they require fewer parameters than nonparametric methods to characterize variation in brain activity. As such, the new approaches to fMRI data analysis are characterized by simultaneously reduced model parameters, increased estimation efficiency, and sufficient model flexibility. This project will develop new nonconvex optimization algorithms to address the computational challenges in analyzing fMRI data. Applying the developed methods to a fMRI study of human emotion, the investigators will examine the difference in brain responses to negative emotional stimuli under different social contact conditions and identify the association between emotion-related brain functions and concomitant affective feelings under different social contact conditions.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.