Spatial selective listening and auditory choice underlie important processes including attending to a speaker at a cocktail party and knowing how (or if) to respond. To examine task encoding and relative timing of potential neural substrates underlying these behaviors, we developed a spatial selective detection paradigm for monkeys, and recorded activity in primary auditory cortex (AC), dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (dlPFC) and the basolateral amygdala (BLA). A comparison of neural responses among these three areas showed that, as expected, AC encoded the side of the cue and target characteristics before dlPFC and BLA. Interestingly, AC also encoded the monkey's choice before dlPFC and around the time of BLA. Generally, BLA showed weak responses to all task features except the choice. Decoding analyses suggested that errors followed from a failure to encode the target stimulus in both AC and dlPFC, but again, these differences arose earlier in AC. The similarities between AC and dlPFC responses were abolished during passive sensory stimulation with identical trial conditions, suggesting that the robust sensory encoding in dlPFC is contextually gated. Thus, counter to a strictly PFC-driven decision process, in this spatial selective listening task, AC neural activity represents the sensory and decision information before dlPFC. Unlike in the visual domain, in this auditory task, the BLA does not appear to be robustly involved in selective spatial processing. Significance StatementWe examined neural correlates of an auditory spatial selective listening task by recording single neuron activity in behaving monkeys from the amygdala, dorsal-lateral prefrontal cortex, and auditory cortex. We found that auditory cortex coded spatial cues and choice-related activity before dorsal-lateral prefrontal cortex or the amygdala. Auditory cortex also had robust delay period activity. Therefore, we found that auditory cortex could support the neural computations that underlie the behavioral processes in the task.
Influential theories implicate variations in the mechanisms supporting threat learning in the severity of anxiety symptoms. We use computational models of associative learning in conjunction with structural imaging to explicate links among the mechanisms underlying threat learning, their neuroanatomical substrates, and anxiety severity in humans. We recorded skin-conductance data during a threat-learning task from individuals with and without anxiety disorders (N=251; 8-50 years; 116 females). Reinforcement-learning model variants quantified processes hypothesized to relate to anxiety: threat conditioning, threat generalization, safety learning, and threat extinction. We identified the best-fitting models for these processes and tested associations among latent learning parameters, whole-brain anatomy, and anxiety severity. Results indicate that greater anxiety severity related specifically to slower safety learning and slower extinction of response to safe stimuli. Nucleus accumbens gray-matter volume moderated learning-anxiety associations. Using a modeling approach, we identify computational mechanisms linking threat learning and anxiety severity and their neuroanatomical substrates.
Auditory selective listening and decision making underlies important processes, including attending to a single speaker in a crowded room, often referred to as the cocktail party problem. To examine the neural mechanisms underlying these behaviors, we developed a novel auditory selective listening paradigm for monkeys. In this task, monkeys had to detect a difficult to discriminate target embedded in noise when presented in a pre-cued location (either left or right) and ignore it if it was in the opposite location. While the animals carried out the task we recorded neural activity in primary auditory cortex (AC), dorsal lateral prefrontal cortex (dlPFC) and the basal lateral amygdala (BLA), given that these areas have been implicated in auditory decision making, selective listing, and/or rewardguided decision making. There were two main findings in the neural data. First, primary AC encoded the side of the cue and target, and the monkey's choice, before either dlPFC or the amygdala. The BLA encoded cue and target variables negligibly, but was engaged at the time of the monkey's choice. Second, decoding analyses suggested that errors followed primarily from a failure to encode the target stimulus in both AC and PFC, but earlier in AC. Thus, AC neural activity is poised to represent the sensory volley and decision making during selective listening before dlPFC, and they both precede activity in BLA.
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