How value and control shape motivation: Dissociable mesocorticolimbic circuits and vmPFC dysfunction in depression

Area of Science:

• Neuroscience
• Psychiatry
• Cognitive Science

Background:

• Motivation integrates anticipated reward value and perceived control over effort.
• Neural mechanisms underlying motivation and their disruption in depression are not fully understood.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate how neural tracking of value and control predicts motivation in healthy adults and individuals with major depressive disorder (MDD).
• To identify specific neural pathways involved in different types of motivation (external vs. internal) and their alterations in MDD.

Main Methods:

• Examined neural activity in the mesocorticolimbic network (VTA, NAc, vmPFC, anterior insula) using 7-Tesla multi-echo fMRI.
• Estimated external and internal motivation based on effort selection for rewards.
• Correlated neural activity with motivation indices and depression symptom severity.

Main Results:

• Nucleus accumbens (NAc) value-tracking correlated with external motivation.
• Ventral tegmental area (VTA) activity predicted both motivation types during control processing.
• Anterior insula and ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) showed selective associations with internal and external motivation, respectively.
• vmPFC recruitment during control evaluation was disrupted in MDD, linked to depression severity and negative affect.

Conclusions:

• Dissociable neural pathways for value and control computations shape motivated behavior.
• A specific disruption in vmPFC-centered control processing is identified in MDD, contributing to motivational deficits.