Overlapping Risky Decision-Making and Olfactory Processing Ability in HIV-Infected Individuals

Area of Science:

• Neuroscience
• Psychology
• Public Health

Background:

• Neuroimaging reveals overlapping brain circuits for decision-making and olfactory processing.
• HIV infection can affect cognitive functions, including decision-making and olfaction.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate if impaired olfactory psychophysical tasks independently predict poor performance on the Iowa Gambling Task (IGT) in HIV+ individuals.
• To examine the relationship between olfactory ability and decision-making in a US cohort of HIV+ individuals.

Main Methods:

• Administered IGT and olfactory psychophysical tasks to 100 HIV+ individuals and 43 controls.
• Utilized confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and structural equation models (SEMs) to analyze constructs of olfactory ability and decision-making.

Main Results:

• Majority of HIV+ participants showed random performance on IGT, lacking a learning curve.
• SEM confirmed nomological validity for correlations between olfactory ability and IGT performance.
• Olfactory ability and IGT performance scores predicted past drug use, with olfaction also predicting hallucinogen use.

Conclusions:

• Simple, office-based olfactory and decision-making tasks may identify HIV+ individuals prone to risky decision-making.
• Joint impairments could correlate with reduced activity in decision-making brain regions, offering clinical and public health value.