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Cortical Brain Activity Reflecting Attentional Biasing Toward Reward-Predicting Cues Covaries with Economic Decision-Making Performance.

Publication ,  Journal Article
San Martín, R; Appelbaum, LG; Huettel, SA; Woldorff, MG
Published in: Cereb Cortex
January 2016

Adaptive choice behavior depends critically on identifying and learning from outcome-predicting cues. We hypothesized that attention may be preferentially directed toward certain outcome-predicting cues. We studied this possibility by analyzing event-related potential (ERP) responses in humans during a probabilistic decision-making task. Participants viewed pairs of outcome-predicting visual cues and then chose to wager either a small (i.e., loss-minimizing) or large (i.e., gain-maximizing) amount of money. The cues were bilaterally presented, which allowed us to extract the relative neural responses to each cue by using a contralateral-versus-ipsilateral ERP contrast. We found an early lateralized ERP response, whose features matched the attention-shift-related N2pc component and whose amplitude scaled with the learned reward-predicting value of the cues as predicted by an attention-for-reward model. Consistently, we found a double dissociation involving the N2pc. Across participants, gain-maximization positively correlated with the N2pc amplitude to the most reliable gain-predicting cue, suggesting an attentional bias toward such cues. Conversely, loss-minimization was negatively correlated with the N2pc amplitude to the most reliable loss-predicting cue, suggesting an attentional avoidance toward such stimuli. These results indicate that learned stimulus-reward associations can influence rapid attention allocation, and that differences in this process are associated with individual differences in economic decision-making performance.

Duke Scholars

Published In

Cereb Cortex

DOI

EISSN

1460-2199

Publication Date

January 2016

Volume

26

Issue

1

Start / End Page

1 / 11

Location

United States

Related Subject Headings

  • Young Adult
  • Visual Perception
  • Space Perception
  • Reward
  • Reaction Time
  • Photic Stimulation
  • Male
  • Humans
  • Female
  • Experimental Psychology
 

Citation

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Chicago
ICMJE
MLA
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San Martín, R., Appelbaum, L. G., Huettel, S. A., & Woldorff, M. G. (2016). Cortical Brain Activity Reflecting Attentional Biasing Toward Reward-Predicting Cues Covaries with Economic Decision-Making Performance. Cereb Cortex, 26(1), 1–11. https://doi.org/10.1093/cercor/bhu160
San Martín, René, Lawrence G. Appelbaum, Scott A. Huettel, and Marty G. Woldorff. “Cortical Brain Activity Reflecting Attentional Biasing Toward Reward-Predicting Cues Covaries with Economic Decision-Making Performance.Cereb Cortex 26, no. 1 (January 2016): 1–11. https://doi.org/10.1093/cercor/bhu160.
San Martín R, Appelbaum LG, Huettel SA, Woldorff MG. Cortical Brain Activity Reflecting Attentional Biasing Toward Reward-Predicting Cues Covaries with Economic Decision-Making Performance. Cereb Cortex. 2016 Jan;26(1):1–11.
San Martín, René, et al. “Cortical Brain Activity Reflecting Attentional Biasing Toward Reward-Predicting Cues Covaries with Economic Decision-Making Performance.Cereb Cortex, vol. 26, no. 1, Jan. 2016, pp. 1–11. Pubmed, doi:10.1093/cercor/bhu160.
San Martín R, Appelbaum LG, Huettel SA, Woldorff MG. Cortical Brain Activity Reflecting Attentional Biasing Toward Reward-Predicting Cues Covaries with Economic Decision-Making Performance. Cereb Cortex. 2016 Jan;26(1):1–11.
Journal cover image

Published In

Cereb Cortex

DOI

EISSN

1460-2199

Publication Date

January 2016

Volume

26

Issue

1

Start / End Page

1 / 11

Location

United States

Related Subject Headings

  • Young Adult
  • Visual Perception
  • Space Perception
  • Reward
  • Reaction Time
  • Photic Stimulation
  • Male
  • Humans
  • Female
  • Experimental Psychology