Identifying the Neural Correlates of Mental Simulation in Multi-Step Planning

Part of paid clinical trials in New York, New York.

Sponsor
New York University
Study ID
NCT07293637
Status
Recruiting
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Conditions

  • Cognition
  • Decision Making
  • Mental Simulation
  • Planning
  • Problem Solving

Eligibility Criteria

Sex
ALL
Age
18 Years - 64 Years
Healthy Volunteers
Accepted

Interventions

  • Four-in-a-Row Task — BEHAVIORAL
    Deterministic, adversarial 'Four-in-a-Row' decision-making task that requires thinking multiple steps ahead. Participants complete a training/gameplay session and a laboratory session in which they choose moves from mid-game positions while behavioral responses (and eye movements, if applicable) are recorded. After the neuroimaging session, participants may play a full match outside the scanner for an additional monetary reward.

Study Details

Planning is the ability to think ahead by considering possible future actions and their consequences. This research study aims to understand how the brain supports multi-step planning by testing whether people simulate promising future move sequences while deciding what to do next. Healthy adult volunteers will learn and play a strategy game called "Four-in-a-Row" (similar to Connect Four). Participants will complete two sessions on successive days: an online behavioral training/playing session and an in-person brain-recording session at New York University. During the brain-recording session, participants will view mid-game board positions and choose the best move while the study team records brain activity (using magnetoencephalography \[MEG\] or functional MRI \[fMRI\]) and eye movements. Data from the game and eye tracking will also be used to fit computational models of planning that help interpret the neural measurements.

Key Dates

Start date
Jul 10, 2025
Status verified
Dec 2025
Primary completion
Mar 31, 2026
Completion
Dec 31, 2026

Study Design

Enrollment
50 participants (estimated)
Allocation
NA
Intervention model
SINGLE_GROUP
Primary purpose
BASIC_SCIENCE

Arms

  • Experimental: MEG cohort
    Single-group study in healthy adults. Participants complete a behavioral training session and then an in-person session performing the Four-in-a-Row planning task during MEG (with an additional MEG localizer task, as applicable).

Primary Outcome Measure

Percent of moves correctly predicted by the behavioral model [ Time Frame: 1 hour ]

Locations (1)

FacilityCityStateZIPSite coordinators
New York UniversityNew YorkNew York10012
Facility contact, Ph.D.
[email protected]
929-399-9886‬
Marcelo G Mattar, PhD (PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR)

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