Adapting a Decision-Making Task to Explore its ERP Correlates Through Adolescence

描述（由申请人提供）：在风险条件下做出有利决策的能力与健康风险行为（如犯罪，酒精和药物使用以及危险的性行为）呈负相关。尽管先前的研究者强调了个体差异的重要性以及有利决策的发展过程，但他们的大部分研究都依赖于设计用于平行现实生活中风险决策的复杂任务。然而，这些任务的复杂性使得它具有挑战性的解构结果效价，概率水平和结果的大小对决策的影响，并检查决策的事件相关电位（ERP）相关。因此，决策的基本过程并没有得到很好的理解。在拟议的研究中，我们将修改现有的决策任务，杯子任务，与ERP技术使用。杯子任务评估的是在纯收益和损失的背景下做出有利决策的能力。每个试验都包括一个无风险的选择，有一定的收益或损失，和一个不确定的，或有风险的选择，有可能增加或减少收益或损失。对风险选择的概率水平和结果大小进行析因操作，基于某些选择和风险选择的相对期望值，产生风险有利、风险等效或风险不利的试验。行为表现（例如，风险不利选择的比例）和电生理性能（例如，将在150名参与者（75名女性）中评估经修改的任务上的所识别的ERP分量的振幅），所述参与者平均分布在三个年龄组中：儿童晚期（10-11岁）、青春期早期（13-14岁）和青春期晚期（16-17岁）。修改后的任务将通过检查此任务的行为和电生理性能和相关的措施，如风险决策的行为指数之间的关联进行验证。此外，由此产生的数据集将提供一个机会，研究从童年后期到青春期后期决策的基本过程的发展。人们认为，研究决策过程的基础将导致更精确的解释模型的发展，将具体的决策过程与以后的健康风险行为联系起来。因此，这种研究思路有可能有助于早期识别儿童和青少年在以后的健康风险行为的风险，并确定潜在的目标或预防性干预服务，为这些高危青年。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The ability to make advantageous decisions under conditions of risk is negatively related to health-risk behaviors such as delinquency, alcohol and drug use, and risky sexual behaviors. Although prior researchers have emphasized the importance of individual differences in and the developmental course of advantageous decision making, much of their research has relied on complex tasks designed to parallel real-life risky decision making. However, the complexity of these tasks has made it challenging to deconstruct the effects of outcome valence, probability level, and outcome magnitude on decision making and to examine the event-related potential (ERP) correlates of decision making. Thus, the underlying processes of decision making are not well understood. In the proposed study, we will modify an existing decision-making task, the Cups Task, for use with ERP techniques. The Cups Task assesses the ability to make advantageous decisions within the context of pure gains and losses. Each trial consists of a riskless choice that has a certain gain or loss and an uncertain, or risky, choice that has the potential to increase or decrease the gain or loss. A factorial manipulation of the probability level and outcome magnitude for the risky choices yields trials that are risk advantageous, risk equivalent, or risk disadvantageous based on the relative expected value of the certain and risky choices. Behavioral performance (e.g., proportion of risk-disadvantageous choices) and electrophysiological performance (e.g., amplitude of identified ERP components) on the modified task will be assessed in 150 participants (75 females) equally distributed across three age groups: late childhood (ages 10-11), early adolescence (ages 13-14), and late adolescence (ages 16-17). The modified task will be validated by examining the associations between behavioral and electrophysiological performance on this task and related measures such as behavioral indices of risky decision making. Additionally, the resulting dataset will provide an opportunity to examine the development of the underlying processes of decision making from late childhood to late adolescence. It is believed that research examining the processes underlying decision making will lead to the development of more precise explanatory models linking specific decision-making processes to later health-risk behaviors. Thus, this vein of research has the potential to aid in the early identification of children and adolescents at risk for later health-risk behaviors and to identify potential targets or preventive intervention services for these at-risk youth.