Related Experiment Video
Updated: May 14, 2026
07:05
Operant Protocols for Assessing the Cost-benefit Analysis During Reinforced Decision Making by Rodents
Published on: September 10, 2018
Interaction between orbital prefrontal and rhinal cortex is required for normal estimates of expected value
Andrew M Clark1, Sebastien Bouret, Adrienne M Young
1Laboratory of Neuropsychology, National Institute of Mental Health, National Institutes of Health, Department of Health and Human Services, Bethesda, Maryland 20892, USA.
Summary
The orbital prefrontal cortex (PFo) and rhinal cortex (Rh) interact to predict reward value. Disrupting this connection impairs monkeys' ability to value rewards based on cues or past experience.
Area of Science:
- Neuroscience
- Decision Neuroscience
- Behavioral Neuroscience
Background:
- Predicting and valuing rewards integrates sensory, associative, and contextual information with preferences.
- Orbital prefrontal cortex (PFo) and rhinal cortex (Rh) are implicated in reward processing, encoding sensory properties/preferences and associations, respectively.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the critical role of direct PFo-Rh interaction in estimating expected reward value.
- To determine if this circuit is essential for cue-reward association or expected value estimation itself.
Main Methods:
- Crossed unilateral ablations of PFo and Rh in monkeys to create functional disconnection.
- Testing monkeys on tasks with visually cued expected value and inferred expected value from reward history.
Main Results:
- Functional disconnection significantly impaired performance on both tasks.
- Disconnected monkeys showed reduced differentiation in performance across reward sizes, suggesting impaired expected value estimation.
Conclusions:
- The interaction between PFo and Rh is crucial for estimating expected value.
- This circuit integrates reward information from PFo with associative/contextual information from Rh.
Related Concept Videos
01:21Association Areas of the Cortex
Association areas are regions of the cerebral cortex that do not have a specific sensory or motor function. Instead, they integrate and interpret information from various sources to enable higher cognitive processes such as memory, learning, and decision-making. Some key association areas include the following:
Prefrontal Association Area: This area is located in the frontal lobe and is involved in planning, decision-making, and moderating social behavior. It connects with primary motor areas,...
Prefrontal Association Area: This area is located in the frontal lobe and is involved in planning, decision-making, and moderating social behavior. It connects with primary motor areas,...
01:14Role of Cerebellum and Prefrontal Cortex in Memory
The cerebellum, while traditionally associated with motor control, also plays a crucial role in memory, particularly in procedural memory, which involves learning motor tasks that become automatic through repetition. For example, studies have shown that when the cerebellum is damaged, individuals or animals lose the ability to learn conditioned motor responses, such as the conditioned eye-blink response in classical conditioning experiments with rabbits. This study demonstrates the cerebellum's...
01:25Olfaction
The sense of smell is achieved through the activities of the olfactory system. It starts when an airborne odorant enters the nasal cavity and reaches olfactory epithelium (OE). The OE is protected by a thin layer of mucus, which also serves the purpose of dissolving more complex compounds into simpler chemical odorants. The size of the OE and the density of sensory neurons varies among species; in humans, the OE is only about 9-10 cm2.
The olfactory receptors are embedded in the cilia of the...
The olfactory receptors are embedded in the cilia of the...
01:22Lobes of the Cerebrum
The cerebral cortex, a critical structure of the brain, is intricately divided into two hemispheres, each consisting of four distinct lobes: occipital, temporal, frontal, and parietal. These lobes function cooperatively to regulate various cognitive and sensory functions, forming the basis of our complex neural capabilities.
Frontal lobe
The frontal lobes, located behind the forehead, are the command center of our brain, controlling personality, intelligence, and voluntary muscle movements.
Frontal lobe
The frontal lobes, located behind the forehead, are the command center of our brain, controlling personality, intelligence, and voluntary muscle movements.