A link between the systems: functional differentiation and integration within the human insula revealed by meta-analysis

By Florian Kurth, Karl Zilles, Peter T. Fox, Angela R. Laird, Simon B. Eickhoff. 2010

1,234 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Whether we feel sympathy for another, listen to our heartbeat, experience pain or negotiate, the insular cortex is thought to integrate perceptions, emotions, thoughts, and plans into one subjective image of “our world”. The insula has hence been ascribed an integrative role, linking information from diverse functional systems. Nevertheless, various anatomical and functional studies in humans and non-human primates also indicate a functional differentiation of this region. In order to investigate this functional differentiation as well as the mechanisms of the functional integration in the insula, we performed activation-likelihood-estimation (ALE) meta-analyses of 1,768 functional neuroimaging experiments. The analysis revealed four functionally distinct regions on the human insula, which map to the social-emotional, the sensorimotor, the olfacto-gustatory, and the cognitive network of the brain. Sensorimotor tasks activated the mid-posterior and social-emotional tasks the anterior-ventral insula. In the central insula activation by olfacto-gustatory stimuli was found, and cognitive tasks elicited activation in the anterior-dorsal region. A conjunction analysis across these domains revealed that aside from basic somatosensory and motor processes all tested functions overlapped on the anterior-dorsal insula. This overlap might constitute a correlate for a functional integration between different functional systems and thus reflect a link between them necessary to integrate different qualities into a coherent experience of the world and setting the context for thoughts and actions.

Subfields: Cognitive Neuroscience, Sensory Systems, Social Psychology

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Citations in the corpus

Behavior, Sensitivity, and power of activation likelihood estimation characterized by massive empirical simulation (2016, neutral): “The more worrisome pattern, however, is found for FDR correction (Laird et al., 2005).”
A Convergent Functional Architecture of the Insula Emerges Across Imaging Modalities (2012, positive): “In the left-hemisphere four-cluster solution, the anterior division separates into a dorsal and ventral part, while the posterior division separates into a middle and posterior part, also consistent with previous observations (Kurth et al., 2010b).”
The neural basis of empathy. (2012, methodology): “These patterns indicate a central role, especially of AI, in integrating interoceptive and affective information (Craig 2009, Critchley et al. 2004, Kurth et al. 2010).”
Electrical stimulation of a small brain area reversibly disrupts consciousness. (2014, neutral): “The anterior-dorsal insula seems to play a role in self-awareness and integrates emotional and cognitive inputs, setting the context for actions [11].”
Naturalizing aesthetics: Brain areas for aesthetic appraisal across sensory modalities (2011, neutral): “This is in good agreement with our findings, except that the anterior insula might be processing the biological significance of all stimuli, not just intra-oral stimuli (Kurth et al., 2010).”
The Integration of Negative Affect, Pain, and Cognitive Control in the Cingulate Cortex (2011, methodology): “Minimum conjunction maps(35) were constructed using the thresholded ALE maps generated for each of the three domains (for a similar approach, see Ref.(36)).”
Co-activation patterns distinguish cortical modules, their connectivity and functional differentiation (2011, methodology): “Regions that co-activated with both clusters delineated in the medial premotor cortex by the co-activation based parcellation were identified using a minimum-statistic conjunction by computing the intersection of the thresholded ALE-maps (Caspers et al., 2010; Kurth et al., 2010).”