Central to the success of the Understanding MRI animations is their relevance and accessibility to the people who most frequently visit the Department of Imaging Neuroscience.

Therefore, to determine the focus of the videos, the team first surveyed nearly 200 research volunteers from both the PLORAS and qMAP-PD research projects, to discover which MRI-related questions they found most interesting and salient.

The most popular questions – What is functional MRI (fMRI)?, How Safe is MRI? and Why use MRI in research? – became the focus of the three videos.

The animations were brought to life using an iterative process, through a series of online focus group sessions with research volunteers and the project team. In these sessions, there was a particular focus on shaping the script, narration and image style, as the animations developed.

Many of the focus group participants had aphasia – a condition affecting the ability to understand or formulate language. People with aphasia are traditionally underrepresented in research due to challenges surrounding communication, but many of these participants are now interested in contributing to further public engagement initiatives. The team was very mindful of making both these online sessions and the animation itself as accessible as possible to people with aphasia.

Thank you to all of the research volunteers who co-developed the animations.