Responses to Heartbeats in Ventromedial Prefrontal Cortex Contribute to Subjective Preference-Based Decisions
Responses to Heartbeats in Ventromedial Prefrontal Cortex Contribute to Subjective Preference-Based Decisions
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DOI：
10.1523/jneurosci.1932-20.2021
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发表时间：
2021-06-09
影响因子：
5.3
通讯作者：
Tallon-Baudry, Catherine
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Azzalini, Damiano;Buot, Anne;Tallon-Baudry, Catherine
决定您是否喜欢《阿甘正传》或《黑客帝国》是基于主观价值观，只有您（决策者）可以通过询问自己来估计和比较。然而，自我反思如何在生物学上实现以及它对主观评价的贡献尚不清楚。我们发现，在腹内侧前额叶皮层中，对心跳的神经反应（一种内感受的自我相关过程）会影响主观价值的皮层表征。皮层心跳监测和价值编码之间的神经相互作用可以预测选择的一致性（即，随着时间的推移，你是否始终更喜欢《阿甘正传》而不是《黑客帝国》。我们的结果为量化决策中的自我相关过程铺平了道路，《阿甘正传》还是《黑客帝国》？基于偏好的决策是主观的，需要自我反思。然而，这些自我相关的特征并没有被已知的评估和选择的神经机制所解释。自我相关的过程已经与一个基本的神经机制联系起来。内感受生物机制，尤其是腹内侧前额叶皮层（vmPFC）的心跳神经监测，该区域也参与价值编码。因此，我们假设心跳的神经监测与 vmPFC 中价值编码的精确度之间存在功能耦合。通过脑磁图，我们在选项呈现之前测量了心跳诱发反应（HER），并证实了在准备主观、自我相关任务时，vmPFC 中的 HER 更大。我们通过时间分辨统计模型检索了选择过程中的预期皮质价值网络。重要的是，我们表明，在选项呈现之前，vmPFC 中的选择过程中，较大的 HER 会伴随着更强的价值编码。这种效应与 vmPFC 基线活动之间的神经相互作用无关。预测随着时间的推移基于偏好的选择一致性，考虑到个体间的差异和试验间的波动，HER 不会与歧视任务中的感知证据编码相互作用。我们的结果表明，基于偏好的决策涉及 HER，而 HER 与 vmPFC 中的主观价值编码的整合有助于偏好稳定性。
Deciding whether you prefer Forrest Gump or The Matrix is based on subjective values, which only you, the decision-maker, can estimate and compare, by asking yourself. Yet, how self-reflection is biologically implemented and its contribution to subjective valuation are not known. We show that in ventromedial prefrontal cortex, the neural response to heartbeats, an interoceptive self-related process, influences the cortical representation of subjective value. The neural interaction between the cortical monitoring of heartbeats and value encoding predicts choice consistency (i.e., whether you consistently prefer Forrest Gump over Matrix over time. Our results pave the way for the quantification of self-related processes in decision-making andForrest Gump or The Matrix? Preference-based decisions are subjective and entail self-reflection. However, these self-related features are unaccounted for by known neural mechanisms of valuation and choice. Self-related processes have been linked to a basic interoceptive biological mechanism, the neural monitoring of heartbeats, in particular in ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC), a region also involved in value encoding. We thus hypothesized a functional coupling between the neural monitoring of heartbeats and the precision of value encoding in vmPFC. Human participants of both sexes were presented with pairs of movie titles. They indicated either which movie they preferred or performed a control objective visual discrimi-nation that did not require self-reflection. Using magnetoencephalography, we measured heartbeat-evoked responses (HERs) before option presentation and confirmed that HERs in vmPFC were larger when preparing for the subjective, self-related task. We retrieved the expected cortical value network during choice with time-resolved statistical modeling. Crucially, we show that larger HERs before option presentation are followed by stronger value encoding during choice in vmPFC. This effect is independent of overall vmPFC baseline activity. The neural interaction between HERs and value encoding predicted preference-based choice consistency over time, accounting for both interindividual differences and trial-to-trial fluctuations within individuals. Neither cardiac activity nor arousal fluctuations could account for any of the effects. HERs did not inter-act with the encoding of perceptual evidence in the discrimination task. Our results show that the self-reflection underlying preference-based decisions involves HERs, and that HER integration to subjective value encoding in vmPFC contributes to preference stability.