  Contemporary accounts of ongoing thought recognise it as a heterogeneous and
multidimensional construct, varying in both form and content. An emerging body
of evidence demonstrates that distinct types of experience are associated with
unique neurocognitive profiles, that can be described at the whole-brain level
as interactions between multiple large-scale networks. The current study sought
to explore the possibility that whole-brain functional connectivity patterns at
rest may be meaningfully related to patterns of ongoing thought that occurred
over this period. Participants underwent resting-state functional magnetic
resonance imaging (rs-fMRI) followed by a questionnaire retrospectively
assessing the content and form of their ongoing thoughts during the scan. A
non-linear dimension reduction algorithm was applied to the rs-fMRI data to
identify components explaining the greatest variance in whole-brain
connectivity patterns, and ongoing thought patterns during the resting-state
were measured retrospectively at the end of the scan. Multivariate analyses
revealed that individuals for whom the connectivity of the sensorimotor system
was maximally distinct from the visual system were most likely to report
thoughts related to finding solutions to problems or goals and least likely to
report thoughts related to the past. These results add to an emerging
literature that suggests that unique patterns of experience are associated with
distinct distributed neurocognitive profiles and highlight that unimodal
systems may play an important role in this process.
