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This Is What Your Brain Does When You’re Not Doing Anything


When your mind is wandering, your brain’s “default mode” network is active. Its discovery 20 years ago inspired a raft of research into networks of brain regions and how they interact with each other.

“It’s been very interesting to see the types of different tasks and paradigms that engage the default mode network in the past 20 years,” said Lucina Uddin, a neuroscientist at the University of California, Los Angeles. According to research, the effects of the default mode network include mind wandering, remembering past experiences, thinking about others’ mental states, envisioning the future and processing language. Investigating how networks are wired up differently in people with mental health disorders can help researchers find underlying mechanisms and develop treatments, she said.

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