Figure 3

Functional connections associated with improvisation: Results of connectivity analyses (improvised vs.conventional) are illustrated.

In (a) the MPFC (−19,49,33, see Methods for more details) is used as a seed region, revealing stronger negative correlations (cool colors) with the DLPFC and IPS and stronger positive correlations (warm colors) with the LIFG, PMd and CMA (cluster extending into the pre-SMA, not pictured) during the improvised condition. Three separate connectivity maps were then generated using peak coordinates (of regions positively correlated with MPFC derived from the above analysis) from LIFG (−54, 12, 21, t = 4.60), CMA (−3, 9, 48, t = 4.49) and pre-SMA (0, 9, 66, t = 4.05) as seeds. The conjunction of these maps (b) reveals that each of these regions is more positively connected to the left amygdala during improvised. [The PMd was not]. In (b), blue highlights voxels in the amygdala with that were significantly more correlated with any one of the three seed regions; red with any two of these regions; yellow with all three. In (c) the peak AMG voxel from the above conjunction map (−21 −9 −24) was used as a seed. The results indicate that during the improvised condition, the left amygdala is itself connected to a wide array of regions in both hemispheres, including the insula, IFG, IPL and ACC.