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Hi Leonardo,

Please see below:


On Fri, 29 Mar 2019 at 18:37, Leonardo Tozzi <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> Dear Experts,
>
>
>
> I have a large number of subjects that have undergone the exact same fMRI
> task. I would like to run an ICA using MELODIC to identify components
> associated with the task design across all subjects. In particular, I would
> be interested in the variation of the components in the subject domain and,
> from what I understand, tensor ICA is suited for this purpose, since it
> returns a subject*component matrix.
>
> I have two questions. First of all, how can one intuitively conceptualize
> the elements of this matrix? Is this a weighting factor that represents the
> individual variation in this component at the subject level?
>

Yes.



> Could I then, for example, choose a component that is associated with my
> task design and correlate the corresponding values of this matrix (one per
> subject) to task performance or a questionnaire?
>

Yes. However, you should not compare component strengths in absolute
values. That is, like with the usual 2D-ICA, tri-dimensional decomposition
cannot preserve the relative variances across components, nor their
sign/direction. As long as you look into correlations or t-statistics, and
do not make inferences on the direction of the effects, results should be
valid and interpretable.

If you look into more than one component, remember to correct for multiple
testing, and note that independence is maximal on the spatial domain, but
not on temporal or subject domains, such that Bonferroni will be
conservative.



> The second questions pertains to dual regression. From what I understand,
> it is common practice to use this procedure to assess the differences in
> spatial extent of components between, for example, two groups. However, if
> I focused on the individual score mentioned above, would it be necessary to
> run a dual regression at all? From my understanding, running dual
> regression would “just” tell me where in the brain the association between
> the group component and the individual’s timeseries is highest, but I am
> not sure how the decomposition in 3 matrices of TICA (instead of 2) factors
> in this procedure (or if it is at all possible). I would imagine that the
> dual regression would allow me to identify the voxels that show the best
> fit to the component, while accounting at the same time for the subject
> score. Is this correct?
>

You can still do the dual regression. It will give something that tensor
ICA doesn't yield: subject-level spatial maps. These can then be subjected
to statistical analysis, allowing for localizing power. Interpretation is
the same as in the usual dual-regression, except noting that differently
than in the temporal concatenation ICA, in which a set of components that
have spatial features that are common across participants is produced, here
a set of components that have temporal AND spatial features that are common
across participant is produced.

Also, I don't think the dual_regression script will run out of the box.
You'd need to tweak it yourself...

All the best,

Anderson




> Thank you very much for your help,
>
>
>
>
>
> Leonardo Tozzi, MD, PhD
>
> Williams PanLab | Postdoctoral Fellow
>
> Stanford University | 401 Quarry Rd
>
> [log in to unmask] | (650) 5615738
>
>
>
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