What are you thinking about when you think about nothing?
CEA
To be able to assess this baseline thought activity, scientists at the CI-NAPS (I2BM) have built a questionnaire designed to define the type of thoughts going on during resting consciousness, when we are thinking about nothing in particular. This questionnaire has provided quantitative evidence that mental activity at rest is formed of memories, essentially expressed as mental snapshots, and forward-looking thoughts that draw more heavily on self-talk. This questionnaire is the very first wakeful mental activity assessment tool to be compatible for use with functional magnetic resonance imaging.
Note that this article was originally published in issue 3 of BIO'actif (March 2010), the CEA Life Sciences Division’s own magazine.