Dysfunctional representation of expected value is associated with reinforcement-based decision-making deficits in adolescents with conduct problems

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Abstract

<div class="section"> <a class="named-anchor" id="S1">  </a> <h5 class="section-title" id="d8188315e158">Background</h5> <p id="P1">Previous work has shown that patients with conduct problems show impairments in reinforcement-based decision-making. However, studies with patients have not previously demonstrated any relationships between impairment in any of the neuro-computations underpinning reinforcement-based decision-making and specific symptom sets (e.g., level of conduct problems (CP) and/or callous-unemotional (CU) traits). </p> </div><div class="section"> <a class="named-anchor" id="S2">  </a> <h5 class="section-title" id="d8188315e163">Methods</h5> <p id="P2">Seventy-two youth (20 female, mean age=13.81 [standard deviation= 2.14], mean IQ= 102.34 [standard deviation= 10.99]) from a residential treatment program and the community completed a passive avoidance task while undergoing functional MRI. </p> </div><div class="section"> <a class="named-anchor" id="S3">  </a> <h5 class="section-title" id="d8188315e168">Results</h5> <p id="P3">Greater levels of CP were associated with poorer task performance. Reduced representation of expected values (EV) when making avoidance responses within bilateral anterior insula cortex/inferior frontal gyrus (AIC/iFG) and striatum was associated with greater levels of CP but not CU traits. </p> </div><div class="section"> <a class="named-anchor" id="S4">  </a> <h5 class="section-title" id="d8188315e173">Conclusions</h5> <p id="P4">The current data indicate that difficulties in the use of value information to motivate decisions to avoid sub-optimal choices are associated with increased levels of CP (though not severity of CU traits). Moreover, they account for the behavioral deficits observed during reinforcement-based decision-making in youth with CP. In short, an individual’s relative failure to utilize value information within AIC/iFG to avoid bad choices is associated with elevated levels of CP. </p> </div>

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Reward representations and reward-related learning in the human brain: insights from neuroimaging.

John O'Doherty (2004)

This review outlines recent findings from human neuroimaging concerning the role of a highly interconnected network of brain areas including orbital and medial prefrontal cortex, amygdala, striatum and dopaminergic mid-brain in reward processing. Distinct reward-related functions can be attributed to different components of this network. Orbitofrontal cortex is involved in coding stimulus reward value and in concert with the amygdala and ventral striatum is implicated in representing predicted future reward. Such representations can be used to guide action selection for reward, a process that depends, at least in part, on orbital and medial prefrontal cortex as well as dorsal striatum.

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Research review: the importance of callous-unemotional traits for developmental models of aggressive and antisocial behavior.

Paul Frick, Stuart White (2008)

The current paper reviews research suggesting that the presence of a callous and unemotional interpersonal style designates an important subgroup of antisocial and aggressive youth. Specifically, callous-unemotional (CU) traits (e.g., lack of guilt, absence of empathy, callous use of others) seem to be relatively stable across childhood and adolescence and they designate a group of youth with a particularly severe, aggressive, and stable pattern of antisocial behavior. Further, antisocial youth with CU traits show a number of distinct emotional, cognitive, and personality characteristics compared to other antisocial youth. These characteristics of youth with CU traits have important implications for causal models of antisocial and aggressive behavior, for methods used to study antisocial youth, and for assessing and treating antisocial and aggressive behavior in children and adolescents.

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The neural basis of financial risk taking.

Camelia M Kuhnen, Brian Knutson (2005)

Investors systematically deviate from rationality when making financial decisions, yet the mechanisms responsible for these deviations have not been identified. Using event-related fMRI, we examined whether anticipatory neural activity would predict optimal and suboptimal choices in a financial decision-making task. We characterized two types of deviations from the optimal investment strategy of a rational risk-neutral agent as risk-seeking mistakes and risk-aversion mistakes. Nucleus accumbens activation preceded risky choices as well as risk-seeking mistakes, while anterior insula activation preceded riskless choices as well as risk-aversion mistakes. These findings suggest that distinct neural circuits linked to anticipatory affect promote different types of financial choices and indicate that excessive activation of these circuits may lead to investing mistakes. Thus, consideration of anticipatory neural mechanisms may add predictive power to the rational actor model of economic decision making.