Selective Devaluation Affects the Processing of Preferred Rewards.
Ontology highlight
ABSTRACT:
SUBMITTER: Huvermann DM
PROVIDER: S-EPMC8455391 | biostudies-literature |
REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature
Similar Datasets
Project description:Decoding the rich temporal dynamics of complex sounds such as speech is constrained by the underlying neuronal-processing mechanisms. Oscillatory theories suggest the existence of one optimal perceptual performance regime at auditory stimulation rates in the delta to theta range (< 10 Hz), but reduced performance in the alpha range (10-14 Hz) is controversial. Additionally, the widely discussed motor system contribution to timing remains unclear. We measured rate discrimination thresholds between 4 and 15 Hz, and auditory-motor coupling strength was estimated through a behavioral auditory-motor synchronization task. In a Bayesian model comparison, high auditory-motor synchronizers showed a larger range of constant optimal temporal judgments than low synchronizers, with performance decreasing in the alpha range. This evidence for optimal processing in the theta range is consistent with preferred oscillatory regimes in auditory cortex that compartmentalize stimulus encoding and processing. The findings suggest, remarkably, that increased auditory-motor synchronization might extend such an optimal range towards faster rates.
| S-EPMC8642338 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Consciously and unconsciously perceived rewards are thought to modulate essential cognitive processes in different ways. However, little is known about whether and how they modulate higher-order social cognitive processes. The present ERP study aimed to investigate the effect of consciously and unconsciously perceived rewards on the temporal course of self-face processing. After a monetary reward (high or low) was presented either supraliminally or subliminally, participants gain this reward by rapidly and correctly judging whether the mouth shape of a probe face and a target face (self, friend, and stranger) were same. Results showed a significant three-way interaction between reward value, reward presentation type, and face type observed at the P3 component. For the supraliminal presentations, self-faces elicited larger P3 after high compared to low reward cues; however, friend-faces elicited smaller P3 and stranger-faces elicited equivalent P3 under this condition. For the subliminal presentations, self-faces still elicited larger P3 for high reward cues, whereas there were no significant P3 differences for friend-faces or stranger-faces. Together, these results suggest that consciously processed rewards have distinct advantages over unconsciously processed rewards in facilitating self-face processing by flexibly and effectively integrating reward value with self-relevance.
| S-EPMC5552778 | biostudies-other
Project description:Mesocorticolimbic neurocircuitry and impulsivity have both been implicated in pathological gambling (PG) and in reward processing. However, the neural underpinnings of specific phases of reward and loss processing in PG and their relationships to impulsivity remain only partially understood. The present functional magnetic resonance imaging study examined brain activity associated with different phases of reward and loss processing in PG. Given an inverse relationship between ventral striatal recruitment during anticipation of monetary rewards and impulsivity in alcohol dependence, the current study explored whether a similar association might also be present in PG.Fourteen adults with PG and 14 control comparison participants performed the Monetary Incentive Delay Task to identify brain activation changes associated with reward/loss prospect, reward/loss anticipation, and reward/loss notification. Impulsivity was assessed separately using the Barratt Impulsiveness Scale.Relative to the control comparison group, the PG group exhibited significantly reduced activity in the ventromedial prefrontal cortex, insula, and ventral striatum during several phases, including the prospect and anticipation phases of both gains and losses. Activity in the ventral striatum correlated inversely with levels of impulsivity in PG participants, consistent with prior findings in alcohol dependence.Relatively decreased activity in corticostriatal neurocircuitry during multiple phases of reward processing suggests consistent alterations in neurocircuitry underlying incentive valuation and loss prediction. Together with findings in alcohol dependence, these results suggest that impulsive tendencies in addictions may be reflected in diminished ventral striatal activations to reward anticipation and may represent targets for treatment development in addictions.
| S-EPMC3460522 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Dopamine-containing neurons have been implicated in reward and decision making. One element of the supporting evidence is that cocaine, like other drugs that increase dopaminergic neurotransmission, powerfully potentiates reward seeking. We analyze this phenomenon from a novel perspective, introducing a new conceptual framework and new methodology for determining the stage(s) of neural processing at which drugs, lesions and physiological manipulations act to influence reward-seeking behavior. Cocaine strongly boosts the proclivity of rats to work for rewarding electrical brain stimulation. We show that the conventional conceptual framework and methods do not distinguish between three conflicting accounts of how the drug produces this effect: increased sensitivity of brain reward circuitry, increased gain, or decreased subjective reward costs. Sensitivity determines the stimulation strength required to produce a reward of a given intensity (a measure analogous to the KM of an enzyme) whereas gain determines the maximum intensity attainable (a measure analogous to the vmax of an enzyme-catalyzed reaction). To distinguish sensitivity changes from the other determinants, we measured and modeled reward seeking as a function of both stimulation strength and opportunity cost. The principal effect of cocaine was a two-fourfold increase in willingness to pay for the electrical reward, an effect consistent with increased gain or decreased subjective cost. This finding challenges the long-standing view that cocaine increases the sensitivity of brain reward circuitry. We discuss the implications of the results and the analytic approach for theories of how dopaminergic neurons and other diffuse modulatory brain systems contribute to reward pursuit, and we explore the implications of the conceptual framework for the study of natural rewards, drug reward, and mood.
| S-EPMC2994896 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Reward seeking is ubiquitous and adaptive in humans. But excessive reward seeking behavior, such as chasing monetary rewards, may lead to diminished subjective well-being. This study examined whether individuals trained in mindfulness meditation show neural evidence of lower susceptibility to monetary rewards. Seventy-eight participants (34 meditators, 44 matched controls) completed the monetary incentive delay task while undergoing functional magnetic resonance imaging. The groups performed equally on the task, but meditators showed lower neural activations in the caudate nucleus during reward anticipation, and elevated bilateral posterior insula activation during reward anticipation. Meditators also evidenced reduced activations in the ventromedial prefrontal cortex during reward receipt compared with controls. Connectivity parameters between the right caudate and bilateral anterior insula were attenuated in meditators during incentive anticipation. In summary, brain regions involved in reward processing-both during reward anticipation and receipt of reward-responded differently in mindfulness meditators than in nonmeditators, indicating that the former are less susceptible to monetary incentives.
| S-EPMC4420752 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Psychophysical experiments suggested a relative importance of a narrow band of spatial frequencies for recognition of face identity in humans. There exists, however, no conclusive evidence of why it is that such frequencies are preferred. To address this question, I examined the amplitude spectra of a large number of face images and observed that face spectra generally fall off more steeply with spatial frequency compared with ordinary natural images. When external face features (such as hair) are suppressed, then whitening of the corresponding mean amplitude spectra revealed higher response amplitudes at those spatial frequencies which are deemed important for processing face identity. The results presented here therefore provide support for that face processing characteristics match corresponding stimulus properties.
| S-EPMC2603213 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Peer victimization (or bullying) is a known risk factor for depression, especially among youth. However, the mechanisms connecting victimization experience to depression symptoms remains unknown. As depression is known to be associated with neural blunting to monetary rewards, aberrant responsiveness to social rewards may be a key deficit connecting socially stressful experiences with later depression. We, therefore, sought to determine whether adolescents' experiences with social stress would be related to their current response to social rewards over less socially relevant monetary rewards. Neural responses to monetary and social rewards were measured using event-related potentials (ERPs) to peer acceptance and rejection feedback (Island Getaway task) and to monetary reward and loss feedback (Doors task) in a sample of 56 late adolescents/emerging young adults followed longitudinally since preschool. In the Island Getaway task, participants voted whether to "keep" or "kick out" each co-player, providing an index of prosocial behavior, and then received feedback about how each player voted for the participant. Analyses tested whether early and recent peer victimization was related to response to rewards (peer acceptance or monetary gains), residualized for response to losses (peer rejection or monetary losses) using the reward positivity (RewP) component. Findings indicated that both experiencing greater early and greater recent peer victimization were significantly associated with participants casting fewer votes to keep other adolescents ("Keep" votes) and that greater early peer victimization was associated with reduced neural response to peer acceptance. Early and recent peer victimization were significantly more associated with neural response to social than monetary rewards. Together, these findings suggest that socially injurious experiences such as peer victimization, especially those occurring early in childhood, relate to two distinct but important findings: that early victimization is associated with later reduced response to peer acceptance, and is associated with later tendency to reject peers. Findings also suggest that there is evidence of specificity to reward processing of different types; thus, future research should expand studies of reward processing beyond monetary rewards to account for the possibility that individual differences may be related to other, more relevant, reward types.
| S-EPMC6554678 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Humor elicits feelings of amusement and can be thought of as a social reward. We identified distinct mesolimbic reward system (MRS) processing patterns for monetary and humorous rewards. During both the reward anticipation and outcome phases, the nucleus accumbens (NAc) and anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) were active in response to monetary cues and monetary gains, while the amygdala and midbrain showed a differential response to humorous rewards, apparently driven by the hedonic enjoyment and appreciation of humor consumption. Psychophysiological interaction analysis (PPI) further demonstrated the functional coupling of the amygdala-midbrain circuit in response to humorous gains during the reward outcome phase, while neural signaling was observed in the NAc-ACC circuit during both the reward anticipation and outcome phases in response to monetary rewards. This is consistent with a view in which the NAc plays a key role in the 'motivation brain', and the amygdala in the 'hedonic brain'. The findings further suggest that the neural mechanisms underlying reward consumption are more modality-specific than those underlying reward anticipation. Our study contributes to a growing understanding of neural responses to social rewards and represent an important first step toward understanding the neural processing of humor as one significant type of social reward.
| S-EPMC6194129 | biostudies-literature
Project description:There is increased concern about poor scientific practices arising from an excessive focus on P-values. Two particularly worrisome practices are selective reporting of significant results and 'P-hacking'. The latter is the manipulation of data collection, usage, or analyses to obtain statistically significant outcomes. Here, we introduce the novel, to our knowledge, concepts of selective reporting of nonsignificant results and 'reverse P-hacking' whereby researchers ensure that tests produce a nonsignificant result. We test whether these practices occur in experiments in which researchers randomly assign subjects to treatment and control groups to minimise differences in confounding variables that might affect the focal outcome. By chance alone, 5% of tests for a group difference in confounding variables should yield a significant result (P < 0.05). If researchers less often report significant findings and/or reverse P-hack to avoid significant outcomes that undermine the ethos that experimental and control groups only differ with respect to actively manipulated variables, we expect significant results from tests for group differences to be under-represented in the literature. We surveyed the behavioural ecology literature and found significantly more nonsignificant P-values reported for tests of group differences in potentially confounding variables than the expected 95% (P = 0.005; N = 250 studies). This novel, to our knowledge, publication bias could result from selective reporting of nonsignificant results and/or from reverse P-hacking. We encourage others to test for a bias toward publishing nonsignificant results in the equivalent context in their own research discipline.
| S-EPMC6364929 | biostudies-literature
Project description:This study investigated whether deciding to either stay with or leave a social relationship partner, based on a sequence of collaborative social interactions, is impacted by (1) observed and (2) anticipated gains and losses associated with the collaboration; and, importantly, (3) whether these effects differ between social and nonsocial contexts. In the social context, participants played an iterated collaborative economic game in which they were dependent on the successes and failures of a game partner in order to increase their monetary payoff, and in which they were free to stop collaborating with this partner whenever they chose. In Study 1, we manipulated the actual success rate of partners, and demonstrated that participants decided to stay longer with 'better' partners. In Study 2, we induced prior expectations about specific partners, while keeping the objective performance of all partners equal, and found that participants decided to stay longer with partners whom they expected to be 'better' than others, irrespective of actual performance. Importantly, both Study 1 and 2 included a nonsocial control condition that was probabilistically identical to the social conditions. All findings were replicated in nonsocial context, but results demonstrated that the effect of prior beliefs on stay/leave decision-making was much less pronounced in a social than a nonsocial context.
| S-EPMC4529303 | biostudies-literature