Falconer, E. et al. The neural networks of inhibitory control in posttraumatic stress disorder. J. Psychiatry Neurosci. 33, 413–422 (2008).

PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

Visser, R. et al. in Intrusive Thinking: From Molecules to Free Will (eds Kalivas, P. W. & Paulus, M. P.) 124–184 (MIT Press, 2020). Results of a conference on intrusive thinking attended by 40 scientists in multiple areas of psychology and neuroscience, capturing multiple perspectives on the topic.

Kalivas, P. W., Gourley, S. L. & Paulus, M. P. Intrusive thinking: circuit and synaptic mechanisms of a transdiagnostic psychiatric symptom. Neurosci. Biobehav. Rev. 150, 105196 (2023).

Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

Watkins, E. R. Constructive and unconstructive repetitive thought. Psychol. Bull. 134, 163–206 (2008).

Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

Payne, A., Kralj, A., Young, J. & Meiser-Stedman, R. The prevalence of intrusive memories in adult depression: a meta-analysis. J. Affect. Disord. 253, 193–202 (2019).

Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Badcock, J. C. & Hugdahl, K. Cognitive mechanisms of auditory verbal hallucinations in psychotic and non-psychotic groups. Neurosci. Biobehav. Rev. 36, 431–438 (2012).

Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Alderson-Day, B. et al. Intentional inhibition but not source memory is related to hallucination-proneness and intrusive thoughts in a university sample. Cortex 113, 267–278 (2019).

Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

Clark, D. A. Intrusive Thoughts in Clinical Disorders: Theory, Research, and Treatment (Guilford, 2005).

Aron, A. R. The neural basis of inhibition in cognitive control. Neurosci. Rev. J. Bringing Neurobiol. Neurol. Psychiatry 13, 214–228 (2007).

Google Scholar 

Jahanshahi, M., Obeso, I., Rothwell, J. C. & Obeso, J. A. A fronto–striato–subthalamic–pallidal network for goal-directed and habitual inhibition. Nat. Rev. Neurosci. 16, 719–732 (2015).

Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Lipszyc, J. & Schachar, R. Inhibitory control and psychopathology: a meta-analysis of studies using the stop signal task. J. Int. Neuropsychol. Soc. 16, 1064–1076 (2010).

Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Logan, G. D. & Cowan, W. B. On the ability to inhibit thought and action: a theory of an act of control. Psychol. Rev. 91, 295–327 (1984).

Article  Google Scholar 

Logan, G. D., Van Zandt, T., Verbruggen, F. & Wagenmakers, E.-J. On the ability to inhibit thought and action: general and special theories of an act of control. Psychol. Rev. 121, 66–95 (2014).

Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Matzke, D., Verbruggen, F. & Logan, G. D. in Stevens’ Handbook of Experimental Psychology and Cognitive Neuroscience (ed. Wixted, J. T.) 1–45 (Wiley, 2018).

Schall, J. D., Palmeri, T. J. & Logan, G. D. Models of inhibitory control. Philos. Trans. R. Soc. B Biol. Sci. 372, 20160193 (2017).

Article  Google Scholar 

Aron, A. R., Robbins, T. W. & Poldrack, R. A. Inhibition and the right inferior frontal cortex: one decade on. Trends Cogn. Sci. 18, 177–185 (2014).

Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Bari, A. & Robbins, T. W. Inhibition and impulsivity: behavioral and neural basis of response control. Prog. Neurobiol. 108, 44–79 (2013).

Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Wessel, J. R. & Anderson, M. C. Neural mechanisms of domain-general inhibitory control. Trends Cogn. Sci. 28, 124–143 (2024). A review of evidence for a domain-general inhibitory control mechanism with a novel proposal about the role of thalamic drive reduction.

Article  Google Scholar 

Apšvalka, D., Ferreira, C. S., Schmitz, T. W., Rowe, J. B. & Anderson, M. C. Dynamic targeting enables domain-general inhibitory control over action and thought by the prefrontal cortex. Nat. Commun. 13, 274 (2022). Important evidence for a domain-general inhibitory control process in right dorsolateral and ventrolateral prefrontal cortices that dynamically shifts connectivity between motor cortex and hippocampus, depending on whether actions or thoughts need to be stopped.

Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

Wimber, M., Alink, A., Charest, I., Kriegeskorte, N. & Anderson, M. C. Retrieval induces adaptive forgetting of competing memories via cortical pattern suppression. Nat. Neurosci. 18, 582–589 (2015).

Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

Kim, H., Smolker, H. R., Smith, L. L., Banich, M. T. & Lewis-Peacock, J. A. Changes to information in working memory depend on distinct removal operations. Nat. Commun. 11, 6239 (2020).

Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

Brewin, C. R., Gregory, J. D., Lipton, M. & Burgess, N. Intrusive images in psychological disorders: characteristics, neural mechanisms, and treatment implications. Psychol. Rev. 117, 210–232 (2010).

Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

Levy, B. J. & Anderson, M. C. Purging of memories from conscious awareness tracked in the human brain. J. Neurosci. 32, 16785–16794 (2012). An early demonstration that intrusions of unwanted thoughts trigger increased suppression of hippocampal activity, indicating that hippocampal downregulation reflects reactive control.

Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

Mace, J. H. in Involuntary Memory (ed. Mace, J. H.) 1–19 (Blackwell Publishing, 2007).

Berntsen, D. Involuntary autobiographical memories and their relation to other forms of spontaneous thoughts. Philos. Trans. R. Soc. B Biol. Sci. 376, 20190693 (2020).

Article  Google Scholar 

Aron, A. R., Robbins, T. W. & Poldrack, R. A. Inhibition and the right inferior frontal cortex. Trends Cogn. Sci. 8, 170–177 (2004).

Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Anderson, M. C. & Weaver, C. in Encyclopedia of Neuroscience (ed. Squire, L. R.) 153–163 (Academic, 2009).

Renoult, L., Irish, M., Moscovitch, M. & Rugg, M. D. From knowing to remembering: the semantic–episodic distinction. Trends Cogn. Sci. 23, 1041–1057 (2019).

Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Tanguay, A. F. et al. The shared and unique neural correlates of personal semantic, general semantic, and episodic memory. eLife 12, e83645 (2023).

Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

Anderson, M. C. & Green, C. Suppressing unwanted memories by executive control. Nature 410, 366–369 (2001). An early demonstration that intentionally stopping the retrieval process induces forgetting of suppressed thoughts, consistent with inhibitory control.

Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Nardo, D. & Anderson, M. C. Everything you ever wanted to know about the think/no-think task, but forgot to ask. Behav. Res. Methods 56, 3831–3860 (2024).

Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

Benoit, R. G. & Anderson, M. C. Opposing mechanisms support the voluntary forgetting of unwanted memories. Neuron 76, 450–460 (2012). Demonstrates two distinct mechanisms for controlling unwanted memories, thought substitution and direct suppression, with opposite effects on hippocampal activity and relying on distinct prefrontal mechanisms.

Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Hertel, P. T. & Calcaterra, G. Intentional forgetting benefits from thought substitution. Psychon. Bull. Rev. 12, 484–489 (2005).

Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Bergström, Z. M., De Fockert, J. W. & Richardson-Klavehn, A. ERP and behavioural evidence for direct suppression of unwanted memories. NeuroImage 48, 726–737 (2009). A pioneering article that dissociates direct suppression and thought substitution as distinct mechanisms of memory control.

Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Aron, A. R. From reactive to proactive and selective control: developing a richer model for stopping inappropriate responses. Biol. Psychiatry 69, e55–e68 (2011).

Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Munakata, Y. et al. A unified framework for inhibitory control. Trends Cogn. Sci. 15, 453–459 (2011).

Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

Bissett, P. G. & Logan, G. D. Selective stopping? Maybe not. J. Exp. Psychol. Gen. 143, 455–472 (2014).

Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Duque, J., Greenhouse, I., Labruna, L. & Ivry, R. B. Physiological markers of motor inhibition during human behavior. Trends Neurosci. 40, 219–236 (2017).

Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

Tarder-Stoll, H., Jayakumar, M., Dimsdale-Zucker, H. R., Günseli, E. & Aly, M. Dynamic internal states shape memory retrieval. Neuropsychologia 138, 107328 (2020).