Modulating the interhemispheric activity balance in the intraparietal sulcus using real-time fMRI neurofeedback: Development and proof-of-concept

The intraparietal sulcus (IPS) plays a key role in the distribution of attention across the visual field. In stroke patients, an imbalance between left and right IPS activity has been related to a spatial bias in visual attention characteristic of hemispatial neglect. In this study, we describe the development and implementation of a real-time functional magnetic resonance imaging neurofeedback protocol to noninvasively and volitionally control the interhemispheric IPS activity balance in neurologically healthy participants. Six participants performed three neurofeedback training sessions across three weeks. Half of them trained to voluntarily increase brain activity in left relative to right IPS, while the other half trained to regulate the IPS activity balance in the opposite direction. Before and after the training, we estimated the distribution of attention across the visual field using a whole and partial report task. Over the course of the training, two of the three participants in the left-IPS group increased the activity in the left relative to the right IPS, while the participants in the right-IPS group were not able to regulate the interhemispheric IPS activity balance. We found no evidence for a decrease in resting-state functional connectivity between left and right IPS, and the spatial distribution of attention did not change over the course of the experiment. This study indicates the possibility to voluntarily modulate the interhemispheric IPS activity balance. Further research is warranted to examine the effectiveness of this technique in the rehabilitation of post-stroke hemispatial neglect.