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Mental Effort Cost Learning is Retrospective.

Asako Mitsuto1,2,3,4,5,6, Rei Akaishi7, Keiichi Onoda5,8

  • 1Department of Psychiatry, Center for Advanced Human Brain Imaging Research, Rutgers University, Piscataway, NJ 08854, USA.

Biorxiv : the Preprint Server for Biology
|November 24, 2025
PubMed
Summary
This summary is machine-generated.

People learn mental effort costs retrospectively, not through temporal-difference learning. Decisions are updated after effort completion, challenging existing models of cognitive effort learning.

Keywords:
fMRIfrontal cortexmental effortprediction errorreinforcement learningstriatumtemporal-difference learninguncertainty

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Area of Science:

  • Cognitive Neuroscience
  • Neuroeconomics

Background:

  • Understanding avoidance of mental effort is key to understanding decision-making.
  • Previous research suggests temporal-difference (TD) learning may underlie effort cost evaluation.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate the learning mechanisms of mental effort costs.
  • To determine if mental effort cost learning aligns with TD learning or other models.

Main Methods:

  • Model-based functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) was employed.
  • Analysis focused on cost prediction errors (CPEs) and brain activity in relevant regions.

Main Results:

  • No correlation was found between CPEs and activity in the dorsomedial frontal cortex/dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dmFC/dACC) or striatum at the cue stage.
  • CPEs correlated with dmFC/dACC (positively) and caudate (negatively) activity upon effort completion.
  • Activity patterns at effort completion predicted subsequent choices.

Conclusions:

  • Mental effort cost learning is a retrospective process, updated at effort completion.
  • Decision policies are updated based on prediction errors between experienced and expected effort.
  • Adaptive learning of mental effort costs does not follow canonical TD learning principles.