Exacerbation of the credit assignment problem in rats with lesions of the medial prefrontal cortex is revealed by Bayesian analysis of behavior in the pre-solution period of learning

Abstract

of the credit assignment problem in rats with lesions of the medial prefrontal cortex is revealed by Bayesian analysis of behavior in the pre-solution period of learning, Behavioural Brain Research (2019),

Impaired cognitive flexibility and heightened urgency are associated with increased alcohol consumption in rodent models of excessive drinking

“…On R1 and EDS stages, the Bayesian analysis of pre‐solution trials indicated that P rats were more likely to use a spatial strategy during this time. Defaulting to a spatial strategy when unsure of the rule, governing the reward location has been previously observed in this task 38 . Impairments in the EDS of P rats are in line with our initial hypothesis that cognitive inflexibility is among the heritable risk factors for excessive alcohol consumption.…”

“…To better understand the strategies used by the two groups of animals to solve the task, we applied a recently proposed Bayesian approach 38 to the exploratory behavior observed at each trial (see Section 2.2.5). Using this method, we calculated the posterior probability ( b‐value ) that the choice on each trial was following a specific behavioral strategy among several putative patterns (either perceptual, based on a specific odor/texture, or spatial).…”

“…In addition to the evaluation of performance from TTC, for each testing stage, a Bayesian analysis of exploratory behavior was performed 38 to quantify whether the animal's choice on each trial was consistent with hypothetical behavioral strategies. A b‐value , representing the probability that the animal was following a specific pattern, was obtained for each of the eight possible strategies considered: four perceptual strategies (i.e., the animal was following either one of the two odors or one of the two textures presented) and four spatial strategies (i.e., staying/shifting side after a correct choice and perseverating/alternating side of choice).…”

Tracking subjects’ strategies in behavioural choice experiments at trial resolution

“…spatial) over another (e.g. cue-driven) ( Birrell and Brown, 2000 ; Floresco et al, 2008 ; Buckley et al, 2009 ; Wang et al, 2019 ). To show how our approach can quantify behavioural flexibility, we thus used our inference algorithm to examine trial resolution changes in choice strategy around rule-switches in the same Y-maze and lever-press tasks.…”

“…Experiments on decision making typically take the form of discrete trials in which a subject is required to make a choice between two or more alternatives ( Packard and McGaugh, 1996 ; Yin and Knowlton, 2004 ; Behrens et al, 2007 ; Churchland et al, 2008 ; Buckley et al, 2009 ; Hanks and Summerfield, 2017 ; Izquierdo et al, 2017 ; Juavinett et al, 2017 ). The subject’s goal is to learn by trial and error the target rule leading to the correct choice ( Mansouri et al, 2020 ), guided by feedback alone (reward and/or error signals; Ito et al (2015 ); Amarante et al (2017 )) or with additional predictive stimuli (such as texture or odour; van Wingerden et al (2010 ); Wang et al (2019 ); Banerjee et al (2020 )). Such experimental designs can be equally applied whether the subject is primate ( Rudebeck et al, 2008 ; Buckley et al, 2009 ; Leeson et al, 2009 ; Shiner et al, 2015 ), rodent ( Raposo et al, 2012 ; Brady and Floresco, 2015 ; Tait et al, 2018 ; Campagner et al, 2019 ; Harris et al, 2021 ), or insect ( Giurfa and Sandoz, 2012 ).…”