Values encoded in orbitofrontal cortex are causally related to economic choices

Ballesta, Sébastien; Shi, Weikang; Conen, Katherine E.; Padoa-Schioppa, Camillo

doi:10.1038/s41586-020-2880-x

Cited by 109 publications

(65 citation statements)

References 44 publications

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“…The decision of navigational goal requires a choice among available positions. This is consistent with a previously suggested role for the OFC in choice decisions based on prior history of choices and subsequent outcomes 21 – 24 . The representation of spatial goal, however, needs to satisfy additional cognitive demand for navigation.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 92%

The orbitofrontal cortex maps future navigational goals

Basu

Gebauer

Herfurth

et al. 2021

Nature

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Accurate navigation to a desired goal requires consecutive estimates of spatial relationships between the current position and future destination throughout the journey. Although neurons in the hippocampal formation can represent the position of an animal as well as its nearby trajectories1–7, their role in determining the destination of the animal has been questioned8,9. It is, thus, unclear whether the brain can possess a precise estimate of target location during active environmental exploration. Here we describe neurons in the rat orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) that form spatial representations persistently pointing to the subsequent goal destination of an animal throughout navigation. This destination coding emerges before the onset of navigation, without direct sensory access to a distal goal, and even predicts the incorrect destination of an animal at the beginning of an error trial. Goal representations in the OFC are maintained by destination-specific neural ensemble dynamics, and their brief perturbation at the onset of a journey led to a navigational error. These findings suggest that the OFC is part of the internal goal map of the brain, enabling animals to navigate precisely to a chosen destination that is beyond the range of sensory perception.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 92%

The orbitofrontal cortex maps future navigational goals

Basu

Gebauer

Herfurth

et al. 2021

Nature

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“…If so, greater randomness in the value-based choice process would increase the rate at which suicide is selected. The notion that value-based choice is disrupted in people at risk for suicide is supported by the IGT findings reviewed earlier and, indirectly, by postmortem and early autoradiographic findings of alterations in the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (Amen et al, 2009;Arango et al, 1997;Oquendo et al, 2003) subserving construction and comparison of values in both learning and revealed preference paradigms (Ballesta et al, 2020;Bartra et al, 2013;Chase et al, 2015). The idea that suicide reflects a stochastic choice is not new.…”

Section: Choice Processesmentioning

confidence: 91%

Search for solutions, learning, simulation, and choice processes in suicidal behavior

Dombrovski

Hallquist

2021

WIRES Cognitive Science

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Suicide may be viewed as an unfortunate outcome of failures in decision processes. Such failures occur when the demands of a crisis exceed a person's capacity to (i) search for options, (ii) learn and simulate possible futures, and (iii) make advantageous value-based choices. Can individual-level decision deficits and biases drive the progression of the suicidal crisis? Our overview of the evidence on this question is informed by clinical theory and grounded in reinforcement learning and behavioral economics. Cohort and case-control studies provide strong evidence that limited cognitive capacity and particularly impaired cognitive control are associated with suicidal behavior, imposing cognitive constraints on decision-making. We conceptualize suicidal ideation as an element of impoverished consideration sets resulting from a search for solutions under cognitive constraints and mood-congruent Pavlovian influences, a view supported by mostly indirect evidence. More compelling is the evidence of impaired learning in people with a history of suicidal behavior. We speculate that an inability to simulate alternative futures using one's model of the world may undermine alternative solutions in a suicidal crisis. The hypothesis supported by the strongest evidence is that the selection of suicide over alternatives is facilitated by a choice process undermined by randomness. Case-control studies using gambling tasks, armed bandits, and delay discounting support this claim. Future experimental studies will need to uncover real-time dynamics of choice processes in suicidal people. In summary, the decision process framework sheds light on neurocognitive mechanisms that facilitate the progression of the suicidal crisis.

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“…Supplementary Table 1 lists the delay durations of all trials. Specifically, there were six delay durations in the experience trials (10,15,20,40, 45, and 50 s). The short-delay condition comprised of the 10-, 15-, and 20-s delays, and the long-delay condition consisted of the 40-, 45-, and 50-s delays.…”

Section: Behavioral Proceduresmentioning

confidence: 99%

Continuous decision to wait for a future reward is guided by fronto-hippocampal anticipatory dynamics

Shintaki

Tanaka

Suzuki

et al. 2021

Preprint

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Foraging is a fundamental food-seeking behavior in a wide range of species that enables survival in an uncertain world. During foraging, behavioral agents constantly face a trade-off between staying in their current location or exploring another. Despite ethological generality and importance of foraging, it remains unclear how the human brain guides continuous decision in such situations. Here we show that anticipatory activity dynamics in the anterior prefrontal cortex (aPFC) and hippocampus underpin foraging for primary rewards. While functional MRI was performed, humans foraged for real liquid rewards available after tens of seconds, and continuous decision during foraging was tracked by a dynamic pattern of brain activity that reflected anticipation of a future reward. When the dynamic anticipatory activity in the aPFC was enhanced, humans remained in their current environment, but when this activity diminished, they explored a new environment. Moreover, the anticipatory activity in the aPFC and hippocampus was associated with distinct decision strategies: aPFC activity was enhanced in humans adopting an exploratory strategy, whereas those remaining stationary showed enhanced activity in the hippocampus. Our results suggest that anticipatory dynamics in the fronto-hippocampal mechanisms underlie continuous decision-making during human foraging.

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Values encoded in orbitofrontal cortex are causally related to economic choices

Cited by 109 publications

References 44 publications

The orbitofrontal cortex maps future navigational goals

The orbitofrontal cortex maps future navigational goals

Search for solutions, learning, simulation, and choice processes in suicidal behavior

Continuous decision to wait for a future reward is guided by fronto-hippocampal anticipatory dynamics

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