How usefulness shapes neural representations during goal-directed behavior

Abstract

Value is often associated with reward, emphasizing its hedonic aspects. However, when circumstances change, value must also change (a compass outvalues gold, if you are lost). How are value representations in the brain reshaped under different behavioral goals? To answer this question, we devised a new task that decouples usefulness from its hedonic attributes, allowing us to study flexible goal-dependent mapping. Here, we show that, unlike sensory cortices, regions in the prefrontal cortex (PFC)—usually associated with value computation—remap their representation of perceptually identical items according to how useful the item has been to achieve a specific goal. Furthermore, we identify a coding scheme in the PFC that represents value regardless of the goal, thus supporting generalization across contexts. Our work questions the dominant view that equates value with reward, showing how a change in goals triggers a reorganization of the neural representation of value, enabling flexible behavior.

Goal-Dependent Hippocampal Representations Facilitate Self-Control

“…Our results are consistent with choice theories that propose that preferences are not stored in an immutable format, but rather constructed at the time of choice and can be influenced by cognitive and contextual factors (26,(36)(37)(38). Cognitive reappraisal, or the modification of the way one thinks about a stimulus in order to change its emotional or other subjective evaluations (33,(39)(40)(41), is a form of goaldependent evaluation of previous and current experiences.…”

“…The participants in this study were self-reported dieters who evaluated the same fifty food items in the context of three separate goals while undergoing functional magnetic resonance imaging (Figure 1). To examine the multi-faceted goal directed representational patterns of episodic memory traces we used representational similarity analyses (RSA), a technique well suited to capture such patterns (24)(25)(26)20).…”

Value signals guide abstraction during learning

“…A good candidate could be the mPFC or the vmPFC in humans ( Mack et al, 2020 ; Tse et al, 2011 ). Indeed, the vmPFC exhibits value signals directly modulated by cognitive requirements ( Castegnetti et al, 2021 ). Our results expose a potential mechanism of how the vmPFC interacts with the HPC in construction of goal-relevant abstractions.…”

Filling the gaps: Cognitive control as a critical lens for understanding mechanisms of value-based decision-making

“…2 C). Recent work has extended these findings to show that even arbitrary goals such as lighting a fire versus tying a boat can flexibly warp putative value representations of options to reflect their usefulness for that goal (Castegnetti, Zurita, & De Martino, 2021), and that multiple potentially conflicting goals can be simultaneously represented in mOFC (Moneta et al, 2021). participants respond faster when choosing among higher value options (overall value effect) regardless of whether their task is to choose the best or the worst option.…”