Skip to content
Open Imaging Index
MRI Brain

IMAGEN

IMAGEN study: reinforcement-related behaviour in normal brain function and psychopathology

Brain MRI, genomics and psychiatric assessments of European adolescents followed from age 14 into early adulthood, to study how genes, brain and environment shape reward sensitivity, impulsivity and the onset of mental and substance use disorders. Over 2,000 people at 8 sites, scanned at 14, 19 and 22.

Go to dataset Edit Report

Overview

IMAGEN is a European longitudinal cohort that follows adolescents from age 14 into early adulthood to study how genes, brain structure and function, and environment shape reward sensitivity, impulsivity, emotional reactivity and the onset of psychiatric and substance use disorders. The IMAGEN Consortium recruited participants through schools at eight centres: London, Nottingham, Dublin, Paris, Berlin, Hamburg, Mannheim and Dresden. The data are hosted at CEA NeuroSpin and released in numbered versions; 2.7 is the latest named in the databank documentation.

Composition

The database holds data from over 2,000 adolescents and their parents. There are four time points: baseline at about 14 years (BL), follow-up 1 at 16 (FU1), follow-up 2 at 19 (FU2) and follow-up 3 at 22 to 23 (FU3). Besides imaging, the release contains neuropsychological tests (CANTAB), psychiatric interviews (DAWBA), questionnaires on personality, family, environment and alcohol and drug use, coarse geolocation, and genomics: DNA genotypes, DNA methylation and RNA sequencing.

Acquisition

Participants were scanned at BL, FU2 and FU3; FU1 was questionnaire-only. The raw image folders hold a 3D MPRAGE T1w scan, T2w, FLAIR, diffusion tensor imaging, field maps, resting-state fMRI and three task fMRI paradigms (monetary incentive delay, stop signal and emotional faces). NODDI diffusion was added at FU3 for part of the cohort. The centres used Siemens (Trio, Verio), Philips and GE scanners, and Berlin started baseline on a Bruker system. The site-specific protocols are published on GitHub. Raw images are shared as NIfTI, together with FreeSurfer, CAT12, FSL DTI, TBSS and SPM or HALFpipe fMRI derivatives.

Known limitations

  • 20 sibling pairs are in the cohort, although siblings were meant to be excluded; the consortium lists them.
  • At follow-up some sites used a different EPI phase-encoding direction from baseline, and kept it for consistency within participants.
  • MPRAGE geometric distortion varies by scanner (phantom SD of about 0.4% to 2.9%), which affects cortical thickness.
  • Sex is recorded inconsistently across tables; the consortium provides a reference table.
  • Access needs an approved proposal with an IMAGEN principal investigator for each manuscript.

License and access

Our reading of the license, not legal advice. Before you use the data, read the original license and confirm that your use is allowed. We take no responsibility for how you use a dataset. Full disclaimer

Access
Application

A research proposal is reviewed and approved

Access page

IMAGEN Data Access Policy

Researchers send a one-manuscript proposal, sponsored by an IMAGEN principal investigator, to the IMAGEN Executive Committee. Only the people named in an approved proposal get a database account. Manuscripts must include named consortium members as authors, and researchers outside the EU sign a GDPR data sharing agreement.

Each proposal names an IMAGEN principal investigator and covers one manuscript. Applicants tick their agreement to the Data Access Policy and to the EU GDPR on the proposal form; institutions outside the EU without an adequacy decision also complete a Transfer Impact Assessment and sign a GDPR data sharing agreement.

Original license text Version read: PDF dated 28 October 2024, with the IMAGEN Proposal Form terms and conditions Checked 2026-10-09

What you can do

  • Not stated
  • Not stated
  • Train ML models Not stated
  • Create derived data Not stated
  • Conditional

What you can share

  • Not stated
  • Share derived data Not stated
  • Share trained models Not stated

What you must do

  • Yes
  • Share alike No
  • Yes
  • Ethics approval No
  • No
  • Release code No
  • Return results No
  • Delete after use No

Limits

  • No
  • Conditional

Citation

Schumann G, Loth E, Banaschewski T, et al. The IMAGEN study: reinforcement-related behaviour in normal brain function and psychopathology. Molecular Psychiatry 15(12):1128-1139 (2010). doi:10.1038/mp.2010.4. Dataset: IMAGEN Consortium, IMAGEN study dataset, doi:10.25720/p1ma-genq

Sources

Every number on this page comes from one of these documents. Each chart names the table or page it is taken from. The raw numbers are in stats.csv.