Study identifies research strategies for linking brain function and structure to behavior and health

Brain-wide association studies, which use magnetic resonance imaging to identify relationships between brain structure or function and human behavior or health, have been criticized for producing results that often cannot be replicated by other researchers.

A study published in Nature shows that careful attention to research design can significantly improve the reliability of this type of research. For the study, Kaidi Kang, a biostatistics Ph.D. student Simon Vandekar, Ph.D., associate professor of Biostatistics, and colleagues analyzed data from more than 77,000 brain scans from 63 studies.

The researchers found that studies can achieve more reliable results by strategically selecting study participants to ensure a wider range of measured characteristics. For example, when studying age-related brain changes, involving more participants at both younger and older age groups yields more reliable findings than random sampling or concentrating on middle-aged participants.

The study also found that collecting multiple brain scans from the same person over time can improve the reliability of some brain measures, but may actually decrease the reliability of others, depending on what is being studied.

Based on their findings, the authors provide practical guidance for scientists designing future brain imaging studies, potentially allowing them to obtain reliable results with fewer participants.

Kang and Vandekar were joined by researchers from six institutions in the US and the UK. Others in the Vanderbilt study include Jiangmei Xiong, MS, Megan Jones, Ran Tao, Ph.D., and Jonathan Schildcrout, Ph.D.