Related Experiment Video
Updated: Oct 28, 2025
13:04
Measuring the Subjective Value of Risky and Ambiguous Options using Experimental Economics and Functional MRI Methods
Published on: September 19, 2012
12.2K
An association between prediction errors and risk-seeking: Theory and behavioral evidence
Moritz Moeller1, Jan Grohn2, Sanjay Manohar1,2
1Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences, University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom.
Plos Computational Biology
|July 16, 2021
Summary
Reward prediction errors (RPEs) influence decision-making by altering risk preferences. Positive RPEs increase risk-seeking behavior, while negative RPEs promote risk-aversion, linking learning and choice under uncertainty.
Area of Science:
- Neuroscience
- Decision Science
- Behavioral Economics
Background:
- Reward prediction errors (RPEs) are crucial for learning and linked to dopamine.
- Risk preferences, biases in decision-making under uncertainty, are also modulated by dopamine.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the behavioral link between RPEs and risk preferences.
- To test the hypothesis that RPEs dynamically modulate risk-seeking and risk-aversion.
Main Methods:
- Theoretical modeling based on basal ganglia learning theories.
- Empirical testing using a novel bandit task with independent value and risk variations.
- Behavioral analysis of choices following conditions with positive and negative RPEs.
Main Results:
- Positive RPEs were predicted to increase risk-seeking, and negative RPEs to increase risk-aversion.
- Empirical results confirmed the predictions: participants exhibited increased risk-seeking after positive RPEs and increased risk-aversion after negative RPEs.
- Findings were independent of nonlinear utility or dynamic learning rates.
Conclusions:
- RPEs dynamically modulate risk preferences, demonstrating a direct behavioral link between value learning and choice under uncertainty.
- This provides evidence for a unified dopaminergic mechanism influencing both learning and risk attitude.
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