Evidence map›Paper›PMID 30311838›Full record

ReviewThe Neuroscientist : a review journal bringing neurobiology, neurology and psychiatry2019

Twitches, Blinks, and Fidgets: Important Generators of Ongoing Neural Activity.

Patrick J Drew, Aaron T Winder, Qingguang Zhang

Abstract readReview
In one paragraph

Review in The Neuroscientist : a review journal bringing neurobiology, neurology and psychiatry, 2019. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 50 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
50citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
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

50 citing papers in PubMed.

  1. Trial
  2. Ultrafast venous and sagittal sinus constrictions in the brain driven by abdominal pressure.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026
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  7. Brainwide blood volume reflects opposing neural populations.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2025
    Article
  8. Article
  9. Article
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  11. Interhemispheric resting-state functional connectivity correlates with spontaneous neural interactions.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2025
    Article
  12. Type-I nNOS neurons orchestrate cortical neural activity and vasomotion.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2025
    Article
  13. Neurophotonics · 2025
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  14. Article
  15. Review
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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

3 authors.

Patrick J DrewDepartment of Engineering Science and Mechanics, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA, USA.ORCID 0000-0002-7483-7378
Aaron T WinderDepartment of Engineering Science and Mechanics, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA, USA.
Qingguang ZhangDepartment of Engineering Science and Mechanics, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA, USA.ORCID 0000-0003-4500-813X

Funding

Mechanistic dissection of the neural basis of the resting-state fMRI signal using multi-modal approachesRF1MH114224 · NIMH · PENNSYLVANIA STATE UNIVERSITY, THE · PI DREW, PATRICK JAMES, ZHANG, NANYIN · 2017 to 2018
$3.8M
Imaging neurovascular coupling and functional connectivity in the behaving mouseR01NS078168 · NINDS · PENNSYLVANIA STATE UNIVERSITY, THE · PI DREW, PATRICK JAMES · 2013 to 2023
$3.3M
Neurovascular coupling during spontaneous and sensory evoked activityR01NS079737 · NINDS · PENNSYLVANIA STATE UNIVERSITY, THE · PI DREW, PATRICK JAMES · 2012 to 2016
$1.6M
NIMH NIH HHS RF1 MH114224NINDS NIH HHS R01 NS078168NINDS NIH HHS R01 NS079737
6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Animals and humans continuously engage in small, spontaneous motor actions, such as blinking, whisking, and postural adjustments ("fidgeting"). These movements are accompanied by changes in neural activity in sensory and motor regions of the brain. The frequency of these motions varies in time, is affected by sensory stimuli, arousal levels, and pathology. These fidgeting behaviors can be entrained by sensory stimuli. Fidgeting behaviors will cause distributed, bilateral functional activation in the 0.01 to 0.1 Hz frequency range that will show up in functional magnetic resonance imaging and wide-field calcium neuroimaging studies, and will contribute to the observed functional connectivity among brain regions. However, despite the large potential of these behaviors to drive brain-wide activity, these fidget-like behaviors are rarely monitored. We argue that studies of spontaneous and evoked brain dynamics in awake animals and humans should closely monitor these fidgeting behaviors. Differences in these fidgeting behaviors due to arousal or pathology will "contaminate" ongoing neural activity, and lead to apparent differences in functional connectivity. Monitoring and accounting for the brain-wide activations by these behaviors is essential during experiments to differentiate fidget-driven activity from internally driven neural dynamics.

Indexed as

AnimalsBehavior, AnimalBlinkingBrainDeglutitionHumansMotor ActivityRespirationSensorimotor CortexTongueVibrissaeresting-statesensorimotorspontaneous activitytwitchwhisking

Identifiers

PMID30311838
PMCPMC6800083

What OpenQuestion holds

Textmetadata
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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.