Reward articles within Nature Communications

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  • Article
    | Open Access

    Chronic nicotine exposure impacts various components of decision-making processes, such as exploratory behaviors. Here, the authors identify the cellular mechanism and show that chronic nicotine exposure increases the tonic activity of VTA dopaminergic neurons and reduces exploration in mice.

    • Malou Dongelmans
    • , Romain Durand-de Cuttoli
    •  & Philippe Faure

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Animals distribute their choices between alternative options according to relative reinforcement they receive from those options (matching law). Here, the authors propose metrics based on information theory that can predict this global behavioral rule based on local response to reward feedback.

    • Ethan Trepka
    • , Mehran Spitmaan
    •  & Alireza Soltani

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The role of complex spikes in reinforcement learning is still unclear. Here, the authors show that complex spikes carry multiple context based, cell type specific and learning dependent signals that are independent of changes in any motor kinematics and unlikely to instruct the concurrent simple spike activity during reinforcement learning.

    • Naveen Sendhilnathan
    • , Anna Ipata
    •  & Michael E. Goldberg

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The willingness to exert effort into demanding tasks often declines over time through fatigue. Here the authors provide a computational account of the moment-to-moment dynamics of fatigue and its impact on effort-based choices, and reveal the neural mechanisms that underlie such computations.

    • Tanja Müller
    • , Miriam C. Klein-Flügge
    •  & Matthew A. J. Apps

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Sleep is known to promote memory consolidation, but the extent to which this is dependent on the memory’s relevance remains unclear. Here, the authors use a brain decoding approach to show that neural representations of rewarded experiences undergo a privileged reactivation during sleep, favouring their consolidation.

    • Virginie Sterpenich
    • , Mojca K. M. van Schie
    •  & Sophie Schwartz

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Acute stress transiently disrupts reward-seeking behaviour and repeated stress exposure produces lasting anhedonia-like behaviour in rodents. Here, the authors show that stress triggers GABAergic activity in the ventral tegmental area which blunts reward-seeking behaviour in mice.

    • Daniel C. Lowes
    • , Linda A. Chamberlin
    •  & Alexander Z. Harris

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Whether maximizing rewards and minimizing punishments rely on distinct brain learning systems remains debated. Here, using intracerebral recordings in humans, the authors provide evidence for brain regions differentially engaged in signaling reward and punishment prediction errors that prescribe repetition versus avoidance of past choices.

    • Maëlle C. M. Gueguen
    • , Alizée Lopez-Persem
    •  & Julien Bastin

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Value-based decision making involves choosing from multiple options with different values. The authors identify a neural mechanism that directly transforms absolute values to categorical choices within the superior colliculus and which supports value-based decision making critical for real-world economic behaviours.

    • Beizhen Zhang
    • , Janis Ying Ying Kan
    •  & Michael Christopher Dorris

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The supramammillary region (SuM) regulates arousal that reinforces and energizes behavioral interaction with the environment. Here the authors investigate how SuM neurons interact with medial septal neurons and ventral tegmental dopamine neurons to regulate motivation for environmental interaction.

    • Andrew J. Kesner
    • , Rick Shin
    •  & Satoshi Ikemoto

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Dopamine neurons in the mushroom body help Drosophila learn to approach rewards and avoid punishments. Here, the authors propose a model in which dopaminergic learning signals encode reinforcement prediction errors by utilising feedback reinforcement predictions from mushroom body output neurons.

    • James E. M. Bennett
    • , Andrew Philippides
    •  & Thomas Nowotny

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Hedonic feeding occurs in the absence of metabolic need and plays a critical role in the excessive feeding that underlies obesity. The authors show that optogenetic manipulation of NAc inputs from the prefrontal cortex versus inputs from the anterior paraventricular nucleus of the thalamus has opposite effects on high fat intake.

    • Daniel J. Christoffel
    • , Jessica J. Walsh
    •  & Robert C. Malenka

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The anterior cingulate plays a role in addiction, but studies have not examined the role of its two types of glutamatergic projection neurons, pyramidal tract (PT) and intratelencephalic (IT). Here we demonstrate that these two populations regulate distinct features of a drug experience, its positive and negative aspects, respectively.

    • A. F. Garcia
    • , E. A. Crummy
    •  & S. M. Ferguson

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The challenge of sensory substitution as a therapeutic approach is to design systems that are well accepted by subjects. Here, in deaf songbirds, the authors substitute hearing with vision, suggesting substitution devices could provide sensory feedback for the key actions that are deprived.

    • Anja T. Zai
    • , Sophie Cavé-Lopez
    •  & Richard H. R. Hahnloser

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Decisions under uncertainty involve a balance between exploiting familiar valuable options and exploring unfamiliar ones. Here, the authors study hippocampal responses using fMRI during a reinforcement learning task, and show the differential involvement of the anterior-posterior regions in the explore-exploit aspects of the task.

    • Alexandre Y. Dombrovski
    • , Beatriz Luna
    •  & Michael N. Hallquist

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The rhesus macaque is an important model species in several branches of science, but the utility of this model would be enhanced by the ability to measure behaviour throughout pose. Here, the authors describe a deep learning-based markerless motion capture system for estimating 3D pose in freely moving macaques.

    • Praneet C. Bala
    • , Benjamin R. Eisenreich
    •  & Jan Zimmermann

  • Article
    | Open Access

    This study shows that cerebellar molecular layer interneurons (MLIs) develop responses encoding for identity of the stimulus in an associative learning task. Chemogenetic inhibition of MLIs decreased the ability of mice to discriminate stimuli suggesting that MLIs encode for stimulus valence.

    • Ming Ma
    • , Gregory L. Futia
    •  & Diego Restrepo

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Alcohol craving can be enhanced by alcohol-associated cues and by alcohol-associated contexts. Here the authors investigate the role of the ventral tegmental area (VTA)-to-nucleus accumbens (NAc) core and VTA-to-NAc shell circuits in mediating these distinct aspects of alcohol seeking behaviour in rats.

    • Milan D. Valyear
    • , Iulia Glovaci
    •  & Nadia Chaudhri

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The vagus nerve transmits signals between the gut and the brain thereby tuning motivated behavior to physiological needs. Here, the authors show that acute non-invasive stimulation of the vagus nerve via the ear enhances the invigoration of effort for rewards.

    • Monja P. Neuser
    • , Vanessa Teckentrup
    •  & Nils B. Kroemer

  • Article
    | Open Access

    In value-based decision-making, single prefrontal neurons represent multiple variables at different times in the decision process. Here, the authors show these representations to be separable and stable at the population level, allowing read out of specific variables at behaviorally relevant times.

    • Daniel L. Kimmel
    • , Gamaleldin F. Elsayed
    •  & William T. Newsome

  • Article
    | Open Access

    It is not entirely understood how network plasticity produces the coding of predicted value during stimulus-outcome learning. Here, the authors reveal a reinforcing loop in distributed limbic circuits, transforming sensory stimuli into reward prediction coding broadcasted by dopamine neurons to the brain.

    • Lars-Lennart Oettl
    • , Max Scheller
    •  & Wolfgang Kelsch

  • Article
    | Open Access

    In some types of decision-making, people must accept or forego an option without knowing what prospects might later be available. Here, the authors reveal how a key bias– asymmetric learning from negative versus positive outcomes – emerges in this type of decision.

    • Neil Garrett
    •  & Nathaniel D. Daw

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Optimizing approach-avoidance behavior calls for neural encoding of related motivation outcomes. Here, the authors show that behavioral choice under conflict relies on differential neuronal firing patterns after punishment, in which mPFC neurons decode the outcome’s value and MTL neurons follow by reducing subsequent approach.

    • Tomer Gazit
    • , Tal Gonen
    •  & Itzhak Fried

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Brain disorders can create maladaptive attractions, such as in addiction or self-harming. Here the authors use multiple valence modes of the central amygdala to create such attractions, arbitrarily making rats into ‘sucrose addicts' or ‘cocaine addicts', or causing maladaptive attraction to shocks.

    • Shelley M. Warlow
    • , Erin E. Naffziger
    •  & Kent C. Berridge

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Goal directed behavior requires the sequential retrieval and evaluation of the multiple choices for action and their deterministic outcomes. Here, the authors report sequential, decodable probabilistic outcome representations in magnetoencephalography (MEG) signals during a risky foraging task.

    • Giuseppe Castegnetti
    • , Athina Tzovara
    •  & Dominik R. Bach

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Dopamine neurons are proposed to signal the reward prediction error in model-free reinforcement learning algorithms. Here, the authors show that when given during an associative learning task, optogenetic activation of dopamine neurons causes associative, rather than value, learning.

    • Melissa J. Sharpe
    • , Hannah M. Batchelor
    •  & Geoffrey Schoenbaum

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Pavlovian and instrumentally driven actions often conflict when determining the best outcome. Here, the authors present an arbitration theory supported by human behavioral data where Pavlovian predictors drive action selection in an uncontrollable environment, while more flexible instrumental prediction dominates under conditions of high controllability.

    • Hayley M. Dorfman
    •  & Samuel J. Gershman

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Memories linking environmental cues to alcohol reward are involved in the development and maintenance of heavy drinking. Here, the authors show that a single dose of ketamine, given after retrieval of alcohol-reward memories, disrupts the reconsolidation of these memories and reduces drinking in humans.

    • Ravi K. Das
    • , Grace Gale
    •  & Sunjeev K. Kamboj

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Decision-making research has confounded the reward value of options with their goal-congruency, as the task goal was always to pick the most rewarding option. Here, authors separately asked participants to select the least rewarding of a set of options, revealing a dominant role for goal congruency.

    • Romy Frömer
    • , Carolyn K. Dean Wolf
    •  & Amitai Shenhav

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Recording from monkey orbitofrontal cortex, the authors used composite reward bundles and found individual neuron and population responses that were suitable for economic choice. The responses followed behavioral indifference curves and predicted behavioral choices consistent with formalisms of Revealed Preference Theory.

    • Alexandre Pastor-Bernier
    • , Arkadiusz Stasiak
    •  & Wolfram Schultz

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The underlying transcriptional and cellular events mediating the reduction of dendritic spines on medium spiny neurons of the nucleus accumbens (NAc) remains unknown. Here, authors demonstrate that heroin self-administration negatively regulates the actin-binding protein drebrin in the NAc, which is shown to be transcriptionally repressed by the histone modifier HDAC2, and that overexpression of drebrin is sufficient to decrease drug seeking and increase dendritic spine density

    • Jennifer A. Martin
    • , Craig T. Werner
    •  & David M. Dietz

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The laterodorsal tegmental nucleus (LDT) is known to influence reward processing through its projections to the VTA. Here, the authors report that the cholinergic projections from the LDT to the nucleus accumbens play an important role in motivation and positive reinforcement behaviors.

    • Bárbara Coimbra
    • , Carina Soares-Cunha
    •  & Ana João Rodrigues

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Practice can improve the perception of stimuli used to achieve a task (perceptual learning). Here, the authors show in monkeys that perceptual learning can be produced even for irrelevant stimuli if the stimuli are paired with stimulation of a dopaminergic centre, the ventral tegmental area (VTA).

    • John T. Arsenault
    •  & Wim Vanduffel

  • Comment
    | Open Access

    Qualitative psychological principles are commonly utilized to influence the choices that people make. Can this goal be achieved more efficiently by using quantitative models of choice? Here, we launch an academic competition to compare the effectiveness of these two approaches.

    • Ohad Dan
    •  & Yonatan Loewenstein

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Humans are often inconsistent when choosing between alternatives, but the neural basis of deviations from economic rationality is unclear. Here, the authors show that irrational choices arise in the same brain regions responsible for value computation, implying that brain ‘noise’ may underlie inconsistency.

    • Vered Kurtz-David
    • , Dotan Persitz
    •  & Dino J. Levy

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