Evidence map›Paper›PMID 28342214›Full record

Trial reportHuman brain mapping2017

Real-time fMRI neurofeedback in adolescents with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.

Analucia A Alegria, Melanie Wulff, Helen Brinson, Gareth J Barker, Luke J Norman, Daniel Brandeis, Daniel Stahl, Anthony S David, Eric Taylor, Vincent Giampietro and 1 more

Open access · hybridAbstract readRandomized Controlled Trial
PubMed Full text at PMC Publisher
In one paragraph

Trial report in Human brain mapping, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 61 papers, 8 of them syntheses that pooled it.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
61citing papers in PubMed, 8 pooled it
10.2field-weighted citation impact, top 1% of its field
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

61 citing papers in PubMed, 8 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 155 citations in OpenAlex.

  1. Pooled it
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  9. Promoting Social Connectedness Through Interbrain Neurofeedback.Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences · 2025
    Trial
  10. Effects of fMRI neurofeedback of right inferior frontal cortex on inhibitory brain activation in children with ADHD.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2024
    Trial
  11. Trial
  12. Trial
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  14. Trial
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  17. A Meta-analysis of Randomized Controlled Trials of Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging Neurofeedback for Training of Attention and Related Cognitive Functions.Clinical psychopharmacology and neuroscience : the official scientific journal of the Korean College of Neuropsychopharmacology · 2026
    Review
  18. Review
  19. Article
  20. A scoping review of therapeutic mentoring for youth mental health.Frontiers in child and adolescent psychiatry · 2025
    Review

1 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.

4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

11 authors at 3 institutions in 3 countries.

Analucia A AlegriaDepartment of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience, King's College London, London, United Kingdom.
Melanie WulffDepartment of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience, King's College London, London, United Kingdom.
Helen BrinsonDepartment of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience, King's College London, London, United Kingdom.
Gareth J BarkerCentre for Neuroimaging Science, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience, King's College London, London, United Kingdom.
Luke J NormanDepartment of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience, King's College London, London, United Kingdom.
Daniel BrandeisDepartment of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, Central Institute of Mental Health, Medical Faculty Mannheim/Heidelberg University, Mannheim, Germany.
Daniel StahlDepartment of Biostatistics, King's College London, London, United Kingdom.
Anthony S DavidDepartment of Psychosis Studies, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience King's College London, London, United Kingdom.
Eric TaylorDepartment of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience, King's College London, London, United Kingdom.
Vincent GiampietroCentre for Neuroimaging Science, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience, King's College London, London, United Kingdom.
Katya RubiaDepartment of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience, King's College London, London, United Kingdom.ORCID 0000-0002-1410-7701
King's College London · GBWellcome Centre for Human Neuroimaging · GBUniversity of Zurich · CH

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is associated with poor self-control, underpinned by inferior fronto-striatal deficits. Real-time functional magnetic resonance neurofeedback (rtfMRI-NF) allows participants to gain self-control over dysregulated brain regions. Despite evidence for beneficial effects of electrophysiological-NF on ADHD symptoms, no study has applied the spatially superior rtfMRI-NF neurotherapy to ADHD. A randomized controlled trial tested the efficacy of rtfMRI-NF of right inferior prefrontal cortex (rIFG), a key region that is compromised in ADHD and upregulated with psychostimulants, on improvement of ADHD symptoms, cognition, and inhibitory fMRI activation. To control for region-specificity, an active control group received rtfMRI-NF of the left parahippocampal gyrus (lPHG). Thirty-one ADHD boys were randomly allocated and had to learn to upregulate their target brain region in an average of 11 rtfMRI-NF runs over 2 weeks. Feedback was provided through a video-clip of a rocket that had to be moved up into space. A transfer session without feedback tested learning retention as a proximal measure of transfer to everyday life. Both NF groups showed significant linear activation increases with increasing number of runs in their respective target regions and significant reduction in ADHD symptoms after neurotherapy and at 11-month follow-up. Only the group targeting rIFG, however, showed a transfer effect, which correlated with ADHD symptom reductions, improved at trend level in sustained attention, and showed increased IFG activation during an inhibitory fMRI task. This proof-of-concept study demonstrates for the first time feasibility, safety, and shorter- and longer-term efficacy of rtfMRI-NF of rIFG in adolescents with ADHD. Hum Brain Mapp 38:3190-3209, 2017. © 2017 The Authors Human Brain Mapping Published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Indexed as

Magnetic Resonance ImagingAdolescentAttention Deficit Disorder with HyperactivityChildCognition DisordersFemaleFunctional LateralityHumansImage Processing, Computer-AssistedMaleNeurofeedbackNeuropsychological TestsOxygenPhotic StimulationPsychiatric Status Rating ScalesSingle-Blind MethodOxygenADHDfMRIfMRI-neurofeedbackreal-time fMRI neurofeedbackstop task

Identifiers

PMID28342214
PMCPMC5434828
OpenAlexW2601332751

What OpenQuestion holds

Textmetadata
LicenceCC BY-NC-ND
Read underepoch 390

Registered trials

None linked

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.