Catecholaminergic modulation of the avoidance of cognitive control

The catecholamines have long been associated with cognitive control and value-based decision-making. More recently, we proposed that the catecholamines might modulate value-based decision-making about whether or not to engage in cognitive control. We test this hypothesis by assessing effects of a catecholamine challenge in a large sample of young, healthy adults (n = 100) on the avoidance of a cognitively demanding control process: task switching

Glutamatergic and GABAergic effects on learning and decision making: A pharmacological MEG study with lorazepam, d-cycloserine and placebo

pharmaco-MEG study in the context of the ERC grant NEODYNE, awarded to Prof. Gerhard Jocha

Catecholaminergic modulation of the cost of cognitive control in healthy older adults

This dataset is part of a bigger study, in which we assessed the consequences of acute tyrosine administration (150mg/kg body weight) in older adults (60-75 years old) on: 1) working memory (in prep) 2) response inhibition (DOI: https://doi.org/10.1523/ENEURO.0035-17.2018), 3) cognitive effort valuation (presented here)

Removal of reinforcement improves instrumental performance in humans by decreasing a general action bias rather than unmasking learnt associations

(preprint) Manuscript and data of a project investigating the origins of performance improvements related to feedback removal in a instrumental learning tas

Removal of reinforcement improves instrumental performance in humans by decreasing a general action bias rather than unmasking learnt associations.

Performance during instrumental learning is commonly believed to reflect the knowledge that has been acquired up to that point. However, recent work in rodents found that instrumental performance was enhanced during periods when reinforcement was withheld, relative to periods when reinforcement was provided. This suggests that reinforcement may mask acquired knowledge and lead to impaired performance. In the present study, we investigated whether such a beneficial effect of removing reinforcement translates to humans. Specifically, we tested whether performance during learning was improved during non-reinforced relative to reinforced task periods using signal detection theory and a computational modelling approach. To this end, 60 healthy volunteers performed a novel visual go/no-go learning task with deterministic reinforcement. To probe acquired knowledge in the absence of reinforcement, we interspersed blocks without feedback. In these non-reinforced task blocks, we found an increased d', indicative of enhanced instrumental performance. However, computational modelling showed that this improvement in performance was not due to an increased sensitivity of decision making to learnt values, but to a more cautious mode of responding, as evidenced by a reduction of a general response bias. Together with an initial tendency to act, this is sufficient to drive differential changes in hit and false alarm rates that jointly lead to an increased d'. To conclude, the improved instrumental performance in the absence of reinforcement observed in studies using asymmetrically reinforced go/no-go tasks may reflect a change in response bias rather than unmasking latent knowledge

Bidirectional modulation of reward-guided decision making by dopamine

Data and code of a project investigating dopaminergic effects on reward-guided decision makin

Catecholaminergic modulation of the cost of cognitive control in healthy older adults

Catecholamines have long been associated with cognitive control and value-based decision-making. More recently, we have shown that catecholamines also modulate value-based decision-making about whether or not to engage in cognitive control. Yet it is unclear whether catecholamines influence these decisions by altering the subjective value of control. Thus, we tested whether tyrosine, a catecholamine precursor altered the subjective value of performing a demanding working memory task among healthy older adults (60-75 years). Contrary to our prediction, tyrosine administration did not significantly increase the subjective value of conducting an N-back task for reward, as a main effect. Instead, in line with our previous study, drug effects varied as a function of participants’ trait impulsivity scores. Specifically, tyrosine increased the subjective value of conducting an N-back task in low impulsive participants, while reducing its value in more impulsive participants. One implication of these findings is that the over-the-counter tyrosine supplements may be accompanied by an undermining effect on the motivation to perform demanding cognitive tasks, at least in certain older adults. Taken together, these findings indicate that catecholamines can alter cognitive control by modulating motivation (rather than just the ability) to exert cognitive control

Further Analyses of behavioural and computational data.

In Section 1, we present results separately for the two experiments. In Section 2, we show further analyses of the pooled dataset. In Section 3, analyses of the computational modelling, in particular the control analysis for the fixed learning rate, the parameter recovery and the model validation, are presented. In Section 4, we analysed reaction times. (PDF)</p

Task structure and participants’ behaviour.

(A) Schematic of the go/no-go learning task. On each trial, a fixation cross was presented for 1000–1600 ms. Then, participants were presented with one stimulus for 500 ms and had 1000 ms to decide whether to perform a go (button press) or no-go (no button press) response. Blocks of reinforced trials alternated with probe blocks (illustrated in the timeline). On reinforced trials (cyan), a go response resulted in reward or punishment (monetary win or loss, indicated by a smiley or frowny, respectively), depending on whether the stimulus was a go or no-go stimulus. No-go responses resulted in no feedback, and in neither reward nor punishment. A progress bar at the bottom of the screen displayed cumulative reward (rewards increased the bar, punishments shrank it). On probe block trials (purple), participants were required to respond as during reinforced blocks, but no feedback following responses was provided. (B) Sensitivity index d’, separately for reinforced (cyan) and probe trials (purple). (C) Time course of go-response probabilities, P(Go), for go trials (green) and no-go trials (red). Darker shades of green and red indicate probe trials. Solid lines in B and C represent mean, shaded areas SEM across participants.</p