Hi everyone,

I would really appreciate some guidance regarding my study design and analysis choices in CONN.

I have a within-subject design with 13 participants. Each subject completed two scanning sessions: one before an intervention (teaching a specific skill) and one after a 2-week training period. In each session, a behavioral test was also conducted, so I have two test scores per subject (pre and post). I included these scores as covariates in CONN.

I have two main questions:

1. Analysis method (GCOR):
I decided to use GCOR as part of an exploratory analysis, mainly because there are no previous studies on this topic and my sample size is relatively small (n = 13).
Would GCOR be an appropriate choice in this case, or would you recommend a different approach for exploratory functional connectivity analysis?

2. Second-level model / contrasts:
I am a bit confused about how to correctly set up the second-level analysis.
My goal is to compare pre- vs. post-training connectivity while also taking into account the behavioral test scores (i.e., looking at correlations with performance).

Given that I have:

• Two conditions (pre and post)


• Two test scores per subject (included as covariates)

What would be the correct way to define:

• Subject effects


• Conditions


• Contrasts

to properly assess:
(a) the difference between pre and post, and
(b) the relationship between connectivity changes and test score changes?

Any clarification or example setup would really help.

Thank you!