Correction: Relative changes from prior reward contingencies can constrain brain correlates of outcome monitoring

[This corrects the article on p. e66350 in vol. 8.]

Relative changes from prior reward contingencies can constrain brain correlates of outcome monitoring

It is well-known that the affective value of an environment can be relative to whether it reflects an improvement or a worsening from a previous state. A potential explanation for this phenomenon suggests that relative changes from previous reward contingencies can constrain how brain monitoring systems form predictions about future events. In support of this idea, we found that changes per se relative to previous states of learned reward contingencies modulated the Feedback-Related Negativity (FRN), a human brain potential known to index discrepancies between predictions and affective outcomes. Specifically, we observed that environments with a 50% reward probability yielded different FRN patterns according to whether they reflected an improvement or a worsening from a previous environment. Further, we also found that this pattern of results was driven mainly by variations in the amplitude of ERPs to positive outcomes. Overall, these results suggest that relative changes in reward probability from previous learned environments can constrain how neural systems of outcome monitoring formulate predictions about the likelihood of future rewards and nonrewards

Neural markers of social and monetary rewards in children with Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder and Autism Spectrum Disorder

Recent theories of decision making propose a shared value-related brain mechanism for encoding monetary and social rewards. We tested this model in children with Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) and control children. We monitored participants' brain dynamics using high density-electroencephalography while they played a monetary and social reward tasks. Control children exhibited a feedback Error-Related Negativity (fERN) modulation and Anterior Cingulate Cortex (ACC) source activation during both tasks. Remarkably, although cooperation resulted in greater losses for the participants, the betrayal options generated greater fERN responses. ADHD subjects exhibited an absence of fERN modulation and reduced ACC activation during both tasks. ASD subjects exhibited normal fERN modulation during monetary choices and inverted fERN/ACC responses in social options than did controls. These results suggest that in neurotypicals, monetary losses and observed disloyal social decisions induced similar activity in the brain value system. In ADHD children, difficulties in reward processing affected early brain signatures of monetary and social decisions. Conversely, ASD children showed intact neural markers of value-related monetary mechanisms, but no brain modulation by prosociality in the social task. These results offer insight into the typical and atypical developments of neural correlates of monetary and social reward processing.Fil: González Gadea, María Luz. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Houssay. Instituto de Neurociencia Cognitiva. Fundación Favaloro. Instituto de Neurociencia Cognitiva; ArgentinaFil: Sigman, Mariano. Universidad Torcuato di Tella; ArgentinaFil: Rattazzi, Alexia. Programa Argentino para Niños, Adolescentes y Adultos con Condiciones del Espectro Autista; ArgentinaFil: Lavin, Claudio. Universidad Diego Portales; ChileFil: Rivera Rei, Alvaro. Universidad Diego Portales; ChileFil: Marino, Julián Carlos. Universidad de Granada; España. Universidad Nacional de Córdoba; ArgentinaFil: Manes, Facundo Francisco. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Houssay. Instituto de Neurociencia Cognitiva. Fundación Favaloro. Instituto de Neurociencia Cognitiva; Argentina. Australian Research Council; AustraliaFil: Ibáñez Barassi, Agustín Mariano. Australian Research Council; Australia. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Houssay. Instituto de Neurociencia Cognitiva. Fundación Favaloro. Instituto de Neurociencia Cognitiva; Argentina. Universidad Adolfo Ibañez; Chile. Universidad Autonoma del Caribe; Colombi

Neural markers of social and monetary rewards in children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder and autism spectrum disorder

Recent theories of decision making propose a shared value-related brain mechanism for encoding monetary and social rewards. We tested this model in children with Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) and control children. We monitored participants’ brain dynamics using high density-electroencephalography while they played a monetary and social reward tasks. Control children exhibited a feedback Error-Related Negativity (fERN) modulation and Anterior Cingulate Cortex (ACC) source activation during both tasks. Remarkably, although cooperation resulted in greater losses for the participants, the betrayal options generated greater fERN responses. ADHD subjects exhibited an absence of fERN modulation and reduced ACC activation during both tasks. ASD subjects exhibited normal fERN modulation during monetary choices and inverted fERN/ACC responses in social options than did controls. These results suggest that in neurotypicals, monetary losses and observed disloyal social decisions induced similar activity in the brain value system. In ADHD children, difficulties in reward processing affected early brain signatures of monetary and social decisions. Conversely, ASD children showed intact neural markers of value-related monetary mechanisms, but no brain modulation by prosociality in the social task. These results offer insight into the typical and atypical developments of neural correlates of monetary and social reward processing.Fil: González-Gadea, María Luz. Instituto de Neurociencia Cognitiva y Traslacional (INCYT), Laboratorio de Psicología Experimental y Neurociencias (LPEN), Fundación INECO, Universidad Favaloro, Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas (CONICET), Buenos Aires, ArgentinaFil: Sigman, Mariano. Universidad Torcuato Di Tella, Escuela de Negocios, Laboratorio de Neurociencia, Buenos Aires, ArgentinaFil: Ratazzi, Alexia. Programa Argentino para Niños, Adolescentes y Adultos con Condiciones del Espectro Autista (PANAACEA), Buenos Aires, ArgentinaFil: Lavin, Claudio. Centre for the Study of Argumentation and Reasoning, Faculty of Psychology, Universidad Diego Portales, Santiago, Chile. Laboratorio de Neurociencia Cognitiva y Social (LaNCyS), Facultad de Psicología, Universidad Diego Portales, Santiago, ChileFil: Rivera Rei, Álvaro. Laboratorio de Neurociencia Cognitiva y Social (LaNCyS), Facultad de Psicología, Universidad Diego Portales, Santiago, ChileFil: Marino, Julián. Laboratorio de Neuroimágenes, Universidad Nacional de Córdoba, Argentina. Grupo de Neurociencia Cognitiva, Universidad de Granada, EspañaFil: Manes, Facundo.Laboratorio de Neuroimágenes, Universidad Nacional de Córdoba, Argentina. Grupo de Neurociencia Cognitiva, Universidad de Granada, EspañaFil: Ibáñez, Agustín. Instituto de Neurociencia Cognitiva y Traslacional (INCYT), Laboratorio de Psicología Experimental y Neurociencias (LPEN), Fundación INECO, Universidad Favaloro, Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas (CONICET), Buenos Aires, Argentina. Centre of Excellence in Cognition and its Disorders, Australian Research Council (ACR), New South Wales, Australia. Center for Social and Cognitive Neuroscience (CSCN), School of Psychology, Universidad Adolfo Ibanez, Santiago de Chile, Chile. Universidad Autonoma del Caribe, Barranquilla, Colombi

Individual Differences in Reinforcement Learning: Behavioral, Electrophysiological, and Neuroimaging Correlates

During reinforcement learning, phasic modulations of activity in midbrain dopamine neurons are conveyed to the dorsal anterior cingulate Cortex (dACC) and basal ganglia (BG) and serve to guide adaptive responding. While the animal literature supports a role for the dACC in integrating reward history over time, most human electrophysiological Studies of dACC function have focused on responses to single positive and negative outcomes. The present electrophysiological study investigated the role of the dACC in probabilistic reward learning in healthy subjects using a task that required integration of reinforcement history over time. We recorded the feedback-related negativity (FRN) to reward feedback in subjects who developed a response bias toward a more frequently rewarded ("rich") stimulus ("learners") versus subjects who did not ("non-learners"). Compared to non-learners, learners showed more positive (i.e., smaller) FRNs and greater dACC activation upon receiving reward for correct identification of the rich stimulus. In addition, dACC activation and a bias to select the rich Stimulus were positively correlated. The same participants also completed a monetary incentive delay (MID) task administered during functional magnetic resonance imaging. Compared to non-learners, learners displayed stronger BG responses to reward in the MID task. These findings raise the possibility that learners in the probabilistic reinforcement task were characterized by stronger dACC and BG responses to rewarding outcomes. Furthermore, these results highlight the importance of the dACC to probabilistic reward learning in humans.Psycholog

Behavioral and Psychophysiological Effects of Near-Miss Outcomes in a Game of War

Within the gambling literature, the misidentification of outcomes has been shown to affect gambling behaviors in players. A notably salient stimulus frequently cited as leading to the misidentification of wins is near-misses. Near-misses occur when the outcome of an event closely resembles a winning outcome, even though it is a loss. The current study intended to further investigate the effects of near-misses relative to wins and losses on player’s inter-trial latencies and the presence of the feedback-related negativity (FRN) and P300 event related potentials (ERPs) in a game of war card game. FRN is a negative fronto-central ERP component occurring 200 and 300 ms post-feedback, and P300 is positive centro-parietal ERP component occurring 300 to 600 ms post-feedback. The results of this study revealed decreased amplitudes for FRN and an unanticipated ERP component, N1, following winning outcomes than near-miss or loss outcomes. No differences were observed in latency to resume playing, average bet amount placed on the following round, or the amplitude of an additional unanticipated ERP component, P2. The P300 ERP component was not observed following feedback presentation onset. Near-misses and losses showed no differences across any of the measures included in the current study, indicating the lack of an observed near-miss effect when measuring from feedback presentation. Further studies are needed in order to assess the presence of any possible near-miss effects when measuring from card presentation onset rather than feedback presentation

Prospect theory does not describe the feedback-related negativity value function.

Humans handle uncertainty poorly. Prospect theory accounts for this with a value function in which possible losses are overweighted compared to possible gains, and the marginal utility of rewards decreases with size. fMRI studies have explored the neural basis of this value function. A separate body of research claims that prediction errors are calculated by midbrain dopamine neurons. We investigated whether the prospect theoretic effects shown in behavioral and fMRI studies were present in midbrain prediction error coding by using the feedback-related negativity, an ERP component believed to reflect midbrain prediction errors. Participants' stated satisfaction with outcomes followed prospect theory but their feedback-related negativity did not, instead showing no effect of marginal utility and greater sensitivity to potential gains than losses

Testosterone Reactivity and Neural Activation in the MID task

The purpose of the project was to determine if testosterone reactivity and neural changes could be observed in response to a reward-seeking competitive task, respectively, and whether testosterone was related to neural activation. Forty nine undergraduate students were recruited playing the Monetary Incentive Delay (MID). We found that a subset of participants (N=20) showed testosterone reactivity to the task (ps \u3c .05). During the EEG analyses, cue had a main effect on FRN amplitude in a trend level (p = .084): The large incentive cue triggered smaller (less negative) FRN amplitude than the small incentive cue did (p \u3c .05), especially during the second reward seeking block (A’) (p = .065) and especially within males (p \u3c .05). Testosterone level and reactivity were not further associated with FRN amplitude (ps \u3e .1). Taken together, results show both testosterone and FRN amplitude may be sensitive to a complex reward-seeking and competition

A neural reward prediction error revealed by a meta-analysis of ERPs using great grand averages

Economic approaches to decision making assume that people attach values to prospective goods and act to maximize their obtained value. Neuroeconomics strives to observe these values directly in the brain. A widely used valuation term in formal learning and decision-making models is the reward prediction error: the value of an outcome relative to its expected value. An influential theory (Holroyd & Coles, 2002) claims that an electrophysiological component, feedback related negativity (FRN), codes a reward prediction error in the human brain. Such a component should be sensitive to both the prior likelihood of reward and its magnitude on receipt. A number of studies have found the FRN to be insensitive to reward magnitude, thus questioning the Holroyd and Coles account. However, because of marked inconsistencies in how the FRN is measured, a meaningful synthesis of this evidence is highly problematic. We conducted a meta-analysis of the FRN’s response to both reward magnitude and likelihood using a novel method in which published effect sizes were disregarded in favor of direct measurement of the published waveforms themselves, with these waveforms then averaged to produce “great grand averages.” Under this standardized measure, the meta-analysis revealed strong effects of magnitude and likelihood on the FRN, consistent with it encoding a reward prediction error. In addition, it revealed strong main effects of reward magnitude and likelihood across much of the waveform, indicating sensitivity to unsigned prediction errors or “salience.” The great grand average technique is proposed as a general method for meta-analysis of event-related potential (ERP). (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2016 APA, all rights reserved