A Neural Mechanism Mediating the Impact of Episodic Prospection on Farsighted Decisions
A Neural Mechanism Mediating the Impact of Episodic Prospection on Farsighted Decisions
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DOI：
10.1523/jneurosci.6559-10.2011
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发表时间：
2011-05-04
影响因子：
5.3
通讯作者：
Burgess, Paul W.
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
Benoit, Roland G.;Gilbert, Sam J.;Burgess, Paul W.
人类可以生动地想象未来可能发生的事件。这种能力，即情景展望，允许模拟遥远的结果和愿望。在这里，我们提供的证据，这种能力的适应功能，并阐明其神经元的基础。参与者要么想象花钱的具体事件（e。例如，在一个实施例中，35磅在180天内在酒吧），或只是估计什么钱可以购买的情况下。对未来的想象使随后的货币决策偏向于与更高长期回报相关的选择。因此，它有效地削弱了时间折扣，即，延迟交付以降低奖励价值的倾向。使用功能性磁共振成像，我们牵连内侧喙前额叶皮层（mrPFC）在这种效果。该区域的血氧水平依赖性信号在逐个试验的基础上预测了面向未来的选择。激活反映了想象情节的奖励幅度，更大的奖励敏感性与折扣较少有关。这种效应也与mrPFC-海马耦合增加有关。数据表明，mrPFC使用海马体传达的信息来代表所设想事件的未折扣效用。延迟奖励价值的直接体验可能会偏向有远见的决策。
Humans can vividly imagine possible future events. This faculty, episodic prospection, allows the simulation of distant outcomes and desires. Here, we provide evidence for the adaptive function of this capacity and elucidate its neuronal basis. Participants either imagined specific events of spending money (e. g., 35 pound in 180 days at a pub), or merely estimated what the money could purchase in the scenario. Imagining the future biased subsequent monetary decisions toward choices associated with a higher long-term pay-off. It thus effectively attenuated temporal discounting, i.e., the propensity to devalue rewards with a delay until delivery. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging, we implicate the medial rostral prefrontal cortex (mrPFC) in this effect. Blood oxygen level-dependent signal in this region predicted future-oriented choices on a trial-by-trial basis. Activation reflected the reward magnitude of imagined episodes, and greater reward sensitivity was related to less discounting. This effect was also associated with increased mrPFC-hippocampal coupling. The data suggest that mrPFC uses information conveyed by the hippocampus to represent the undiscounted utility of envisaged events. The immediate experience of the delayed reward value might then bias toward farsighted decisions.