Biology subjects

Hsiao, P.-Y. A.

Publications and source records attributed to Hsiao, P.-Y. A..

3 recordsLinked to original sources

bioRxiv2026

A longitudinal naturalistic fMRI study of trait anxiety and cross-phase consistency in subjective fear signature expression

Persistent fear is a central feature of anxiety, but it remains unclear whether this persistence is more closely related to the consistency of conditioned-threat processing or to the consistency of subjectively experienced fear. Using a longitudinal naturalistic viewing fMRI paradigm, the present study examined whether trait anxiety was associated with cross-phase consistency in the expression of two validated fear-related neural signatures. Forty-two participants completed two fMRI phases separated by approximately three months, viewing the same sequence of 18 naturalistic videos followed by a post-viewing resting-state segment, resulting in 19 corresponding analysis segments for all cross-phase analyses. We applied pre-trained subjective-fear and threat-conditioning signatures to estimate their expression over time and examined how consistently each signature was reexpressed across phases within each participant. We found that higher trait anxiety was significantly associated with greater cross-phase consistency in subjective-fear signature expression, whereas no significant association was observed for threat-conditioning signature expression. This association became more prominent over longer temporal windows and was not detected in the average time series of the amygdala, ventro-medial prefrontal cortex, insula, or hippocampus. These findings suggest that individual differences in trait anxiety are more closely associated with the consistent cross-phase reexpression of distributed neural patterns related to subjective fear than with the stability of conditioned-threat processing or regional neural dynamics. Taken together, this study shows how predictive brain models combined with longitudinal naturalistic viewing provide a new approach for examining individual differences in trait anxiety across repeated experiences of the same naturalistic contexts. HighlightsO_LIHigher trait anxiety predicted greater cross-phase subjective-fear consistency. C_LIO_LINo association emerged for the threat-conditioning neural signature. C_LIO_LIThe subjective-fear effect strengthened over longer temporal windows. C_LIO_LIThe effect was not detected in amygdala, vmPFC, insula, or hippocampus. C_LIO_LILongitudinal naturalistic fMRI tracked fear signatures across three months. C_LI

neuroscience↗

bioRxiv2026

Intersubject variations in national identity ideology map onto variations in neural dynamics during geopolitical video viewing

When people watch the same political narrative, they often form different interpretations. Although prior research has shown that political ideology can shape shared neural responses to sociopolitical content, less is known about how individual differences in national identity ideology are associated with inter-individual similarity in neural dynamics during naturalistic viewing, particularly in sociopolitical contexts where national identity is highly salient in public discourse. We addressed this question across two studies in Taiwan by examining how Greater Chinese ideology relates to positive engagement and neural dynamics during naturalistic viewing of a pro-China video. In Study 1 (N = 52), higher Greater Chinese ideology was associated with greater positive engagement. In Study 2 (N = 60), participants underwent fMRI while viewing the same video. Intersubject representational similarity analysis showed that inter-individual similarity in Greater Chinese ideology was associated with inter-individual similarity in neural dynamics within the frontoparietal control network and default mode network. Notably, neural similarity was primarily observed among participants lower in Greater Chinese ideology, revealing an asymmetric pattern across the ideological continuum. These findings extend prior work on political ideology by demonstrating that national identity ideology is linked to both subjective experience and shared neural dynamics during political narrative processing in a non-Western context. HighlightsO_LINational identity ideology was linked to positive narrative engagement C_LIO_LIIdeology similarity mapped onto neural similarity in the FPN and DMN C_LIO_LIExperience and neural dynamics varied with national identity ideology C_LI

neuroscience↗

bioRxiv2023

ISRSA uncovers the impact of state anxiety on multivariate activation patterns in the human extrastriate cortex

The current study used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and showed that state anxiety modulated extrastriate cortex activity in response to emotionally-charged visual images. State anxiety and neuroimaging data from 53 individuals were subjected to an intersubject representational similarity analysis (ISRSA), wherein the geometries between neural and behavioral data were compared. This analysis identified the extrastriate cortex (fusiform gyrus and area MT) to be the sole regions whose activity patterns covaried with state anxiety. Importantly, we show that this brain-behavior association is revealed when treating state anxiety data as a multidimensional response pattern, rather than a single composite score. This suggests that ISRSA using multivariate distances may be more sensitive in identifying the shared geometries between self-report questionnaires and brain imaging data. Overall, our findings demonstrate that a transient state of anxiety may influence how visual information - especially those relevant to the valence dimension - is processed in the extrastriate cortex.

neuroscience↗