Hierarchical Action Control: Adaptive Collaboration Between Actions and Habits.

Area of Science:

• Neuroscience
• Behavioral Science
• Cognitive Science

Background:

• Instrumental actions typically show goal-directed control, sensitive to consequences.
• Overtraining, stress, neurodegeneration, psychiatric conditions, and drug abuse impair goal-directed control, leading to action independent of outcomes.
• This insensitivity is often linked to habitual control, but a clear definition of habit is lacking.

Purpose of the Study:

• To derive criteria for categorizing responses as habitual.
• To propose a collaborative model for the interaction between goal-directed and habitual control systems.
• To generate predictions about behavior based on this integrated model.

Main Methods:

• Reviewing and considering alternative definitions of habit, including 'chunked action sequences'.
• Developing criteria to distinguish habitual responses.
• Proposing a hierarchical integration model for goal-directed and habitual controllers.

Main Results:

• Established criteria for identifying habitual responses.
• Proposed a collaborative, hierarchically integrated model of action control.
• The model is consistent with existing data and can be implemented associatively and computationally.

Conclusions:

• The proposed collaborative model offers a framework for understanding the interplay between goal-directed and habitual control.
• This model provides a positive definition for habits and generates testable predictions.
• The integration of these control systems influences behavior in predictable ways.