Context and trade-offs characterize real-world threat detection systems: A review and comprehensive framework to improve research practice and resolve the translational crisis

Fendt, Markus; Parsons, Michael H.; Apfelbach, Raimund; Carthey, Alexandra J. R.; Dickman, Chris R.; Endres, Thomas; Frank, Anke S. K.; Heinz, D. E.; Jones, Menna Lloyd; Kiyokawa, Yasushi; Kreutzmann, Judith C.; Roelofs, Karin; Schneider, Miriam; Sulger, J.; Wotjak, Carsten T.; Blumstein, Daniel T.

doi:10.1016/j.neubiorev.2020.05.002

Cited by 22 publications

(20 citation statements)

References 112 publications

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“…Also, in the animal literature freezing is often assessed in terms of response duration rather than magnitude of state-changes, confounding the relation with subsequent action. Future research using more precise translation between animal and human paradigms has the promise to assess similarities and discrepancies in the function of freezing across species 49 .…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Defensive freezing and its relation to approach–avoidance decision-making under threat

Klaassen

Held

Figner

et al. 2021

Sci Rep

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Successful responding to acutely threatening situations requires adequate approach–avoidance decisions. However, it is unclear how threat-induced states—like freezing-related bradycardia—impact the weighing of the potential outcomes of such value-based decisions. Insight into the underlying computations is essential, not only to improve our models of decision-making but also to improve interventions for maladaptive decisions, for instance in anxiety patients and first-responders who frequently have to make decisions under acute threat. Forty-two participants made passive and active approach–avoidance decisions under threat-of-shock when confronted with mixed outcome-prospects (i.e., varying money and shock amounts). Choice behavior was best predicted by a model including individual action-tendencies and bradycardia, beyond the subjective value of the outcome. Moreover, threat-related bradycardia (high-vs-low threat) interacted with subjective value, depending on the action-context (passive-vs-active). Specifically, in action-contexts incongruent with participants’ intrinsic action-tendencies, stronger bradycardia related to diminished effects of subjective value on choice across participants. These findings illustrate the relevance of testing approach–avoidance decisions in relatively ecologically valid conditions of acute and primarily reinforced threat. These mechanistic insights into approach–avoidance conflict-resolution may inspire biofeedback-related techniques to optimize decision-making under threat. Critically, the findings demonstrate the relevance of incorporating internal psychophysiological states and external action-contexts into models of approach–avoidance decision-making.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Defensive freezing and its relation to approach–avoidance decision-making under threat

Klaassen

Held

Figner

et al. 2021

Sci Rep

Self Cite

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“…the foregone reward) with benefits (i.e., potential reward and avoided threat), to select the appropriate instrumental approach. For example, escaping from potential predators incurs a cost in energy expenditure and foregone consumption opportunities which may itself prove survival-critical, while competition with social conspecifics for mating opportunities carries both the benefit of reproductive fitness and the danger of harm from physical conflict (Choi and Kim, 2010;Mobbs and Kim, 2015;Fendt et al, 2020).…”

Section: Threat-anticipatory Freezing Could Bias Value-based Decisionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Approach-Avoidance Decisions Under Threat: The Role of Autonomic Psychophysiological States

et al. 2021

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Acutely challenging or threatening situations frequently require approach-avoidance decisions. Acute threat triggers fast autonomic changes that prepare the body to freeze, fight or flee. However, such autonomic changes may also influence subsequent instrumental approach-avoidance decisions. Since defensive bodily states are often not considered in value-based decision-making models, it remains unclear how they influence the decision-making process. Here, we aim to bridge this gap by discussing the existing literature on the potential role of threat-induced bodily states on decision making and provide a new neurocomputational framework explaining how these effects can facilitate or bias approach-avoid decisions under threat. Theoretical accounts have stated that threat-induced parasympathetic activity is involved in information gathering and decision making. Parasympathetic dominance over sympathetic activity is particularly seen during threat-anticipatory freezing, an evolutionarily conserved response to threat demonstrated across species and characterized by immobility and bradycardia. Although this state of freezing has been linked to altered information processing and action preparation, a full theoretical treatment of the interactions with value-based decision making has not yet been achieved. Our neural framework, which we term the Threat State/Value Integration (TSI) Model, will illustrate how threat-induced bodily states may impact valuation of competing incentives at three stages of the decision-making process, namely at threat evaluation, integration of rewards and threats, and action initiation. Additionally, because altered parasympathetic activity and decision biases have been shown in anxious populations, we will end with discussing how biases in this system can lead to characteristic patterns of avoidance seen in anxiety-related disorders, motivating future pre-clinical and clinical research.

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“…Mappes et al 1998;Bramley et al 2000;Jonsson et al 2000;Carthey and Banks 2018;Stryjek et al 2018;Mazza et al 2019;Westrick et al 2019). This is in part because, despite there being a many studies on the responses of wild animals to stressors, much of the theory on which the expectations for animal responses to stressors arise is based on studies of laboratory-raised animals (Boonstra, 2013;Fendt et al 2020). Wild animals are likely to respond differently to stressors than their laboratory-raised counterparts, because the survival likelihood of wild prey individuals may be improved by their ability to perceive stressors like high predation risk and mount adaptive behavioural responses accordingly (Bókony et al 2009).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Are physiological and behavioural responses to stressors displayed concordantly by wild urban rodents?

Fardell

Bedoya‐Pérez

Dickman

et al. 2021

Sci Nat

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Understanding wild animal responses to stressors underpins effective wildlife management. In order for responses to stressors to be correctly interpreted, it is critical that measurements are taken on wild animals using minimally invasive techniques. Studies investigating wild animal responses to stressors often measure either a single physiological or behavioural variable, but whether such responses are comparable and concordant remains uncertain. We investigated this question in a pilot study that measured responses of wild-caught urban brown and black rats (Rattus norvegicus, Rattus rattus) to fur-based olfactory cues from a predator, the domestic cat (Felis catus); a novel herbivore, the koala (Phascolarctos cinereus); and a familiar herbivore and competitor, the common brushtail possum (Trichosurus vulpecula). Physiological responses, measured by assaying faecal glucocorticoid metabolites, were compared to behavioural responses observed via video recordings. We found that physiological and behavioural responses to stressors were expressed concordantly. There was no sizeable physiological response observed, and the behavioural response when considered across the night was negligible. However, the behavioural response to the predator and competitor cues changed across the observation period, with activity increasing with increasing hours of exposure. Our results indicate that responses of wild rodents to cues are nuanced, with stress responses modulated by behaviour changes that vary over time according to the severity of the perceived threat as animals gather further information. If the physiological response alone had been assessed, this moderated response may not have been evident, and in terms of wildlife management, vital information would have been lost.

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Context and trade-offs characterize real-world threat detection systems: A review and comprehensive framework to improve research practice and resolve the translational crisis

Cited by 22 publications

References 112 publications

Defensive freezing and its relation to approach–avoidance decision-making under threat

Defensive freezing and its relation to approach–avoidance decision-making under threat

Approach-Avoidance Decisions Under Threat: The Role of Autonomic Psychophysiological States

Are physiological and behavioural responses to stressors displayed concordantly by wild urban rodents?

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