This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
To survive in their complex environment, primates must integrate information over time and adjust their actions beyond immediate events. The underlying neurobiological processes, however, remain unclear. Here, we assessed the contribution of the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (VMPFC), a brain region important for value-based decision making. We recorded single VMPFC neurons in monkeys performing a task where obtaining fluid rewards required squeezing a grip. The willingness to perform the action was modulated not only by visual information about Effort and Reward levels, but also by contextual factors such as Trial Number (i.e fatigue and/or satiety) or behavior in recent trials. A greater fraction of VMPFC neurons encoded contextual information, compared to visual stimuli. Moreover, the dynamics of VMPFC firing was more closely related to slow changes in motivational states driven by these contextual factors rather than rapid responses to individual task events. Thus, the firing of VMPFC neurons continuously integrated contextual information and reliably predicted the monkeys's willingness to perform the task. This function might be critical when animals forage in a complex environment and need to integrate information over time. Its relation with motivational states also resonates with the VMPFC's implication in the 'default mode' or in mood disorders.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.