Event Representations and Predictive Processing: The Role of the Midline Default Network Core

The human brain is tightly coupled to the world through its sensory-motor systems-but it also spends a lot of its metabolism talking to itself. One important function of this intrinsic activity is the establishment and updating of event models-representations of the current situation that can predictively guide perception, learning, and action control. Here, we propose that event models largely depend on the default network (DN) midline core that includes the posterior cingulate and anterior medial prefrontal cortex. An increasing body of data indeed suggests that this subnetwork can facilitate stimuli processing during both naturalistic event comprehension and cognitive tasks in which mental representations of prior situations, trials, and task rules can predictively guide attention and performance. This midline core involvement in supporting predictions through event models can make sense of an otherwise complex and conflicting pattern of results regarding the possible cognitive functions subserved by the DN.

Automated summary

The human brain is tightly coupled to the world through its sensory-motor systems, but also spends metabolism in intrinsic activity establishing and updating event models. The default network midline core plays a crucial role in supporting predictions through these event models, which can make sense of complex patterns of cognitive functions in the brain.