Researchers Find Non-Invasive BCI Learning Is Faster When Mappings Follow Brain Structure
Researchers have found that whether people can learn to control a device with their thoughts may depend on whether the control scheme follows the brain's own activity patterns. Participants lying in an MRI scanner controlled a video game avatar in real time by modulating activity in brain regions responsible for spatial navigation. When the researchers then changed the mapping between brain activity and avatar movement, participants could readjust and regain control if the new mapping fell along directions in which their brain activity already varied widely, known as the intrinsic manifold; when the mapping departed from that structure, they never learned it. The researchers say the principle could be used to design BCIs that are easier to learn.