Physical, emotional, and cognitive effort discounting in gain and loss situations

Nishiyama, Ryoji

doi:10.1016/j.beproc.2016.02.004

Cited by 21 publications

(22 citation statements)

References 11 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…This function implies 292 that additional effort devalues a reward to a greater extent if existing effort is high rather than 293 low. The hyperbolic model is described by: = 1+ (Mazur, 1987). This function implies 294 that if additional effort is introduced to existing effort, it devalues reward more if the existing 295 effort is low rather than high.…”

Section: Data and Statistical Analysismentioning

confidence: 99%

Dopamine-dependent loss aversion during effort-based decision-making

Chen¹,

Voets²,

Jenkinson³

et al. 2019

Preprint

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

From psychology to economics there has been substantial interest in how costs (e.g., delay, risk) are represented asymmetrically during decision-making when attempting to gain reward or to avoid punishment. For example, in decision-making under risk, individuals show a tendency to prefer to avoid punishment than to acquire the equivalent reward (loss aversion). Although the cost of physical effort has received significant recent attention due to the evaluation of motor costs being crucial in our daily decisions, it remains unclear whether loss aversion exists during effort-based decision-making. On the one hand, loss aversion may be hardwired due to asymmetric evolutionary pressure on losses and gains and therefore exists across decision-making contexts. On the other hand, distinct brain regions are involved with different decision costs, making it questionable whether similar asymmetries exist. Here, we demonstrate that young healthy participants exhibit loss aversion during effort-based decision-making by exerting more physical effort in order to avoid punishment than to gain a same-size reward. Next, we show that medicated Parkinson’s disease (PD) patients show a reduction in loss aversion compared to age-matched controls. Behavioural and computational analysis revealed that people with PD exerted similar physical effort in return for a reward, but were less willing to produce effort in order to avoid punishment. Therefore, loss aversion is present during effort-based decision-making and can be modulated by altered dopaminergic state. This finding could have important implications for our understanding of clinical disorders that show a reduced willingness to exert effort in the pursuit of reward.Significance StatementLoss aversion – preferring to avoid punishment than to acquire equivalent reward – is an important concept in decision-making under risk. However, little is known about whether loss aversion also exists during decisions where the cost is physical effort. This is surprising given that motor cost shapes human behaviour, and a reduced willingness to exert effort is a characteristic of many clinical disorders. Here, we show that healthy individuals exert more effort to minimise punishment than to maximise reward (loss aversion). We also demonstrate that loss aversion is modulated by altered dopaminergic state by showing that medicated Parkinson’s disease patients exert similar effort to gain reward but less effort to avoid punishment. Therefore, dopamine-dependent loss aversion is crucial for explaining effort-based decision-making.

show abstract

Section: Data and Statistical Analysismentioning

confidence: 99%

Dopamine-dependent loss aversion during effort-based decision-making

Chen¹,

Voets²,

Jenkinson³

et al. 2019

Preprint

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Moreover, actively dealing with a situation or exerting choice may increase a situation's attraction (Niv, Langdon, & Radulescu, 2015; e.g., contra-freeloading: Inglis, Forkman, & Lazarus, 1997;Ogura, 2011). Scarcity of a desired resource (Sehnert, Franks, Yap, & Higgins, 2014), the challenge of a task or the effort needed to reach a goal (Kurzban, Duckworth, Kable, & Myers, 2013;Nishiyama, 2016;Shadmehr, Huang, & Ahmed, 2016) may be rewarding at low but not at high intensity.…”

Section: Valuating a Set Of Stimuli-reactive And Proactive Emotionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…These characteristics may not be independent; for example, predictability may not lessen the effect of a negative stimulus if the stimulus cannot be avoided (Madaro et al, 2016). In addition, the perceived physical (Gross, Woelbert, & Strobel, 2015), emotional and cognitive effort when embarking to reach a goal (in the state of wanting), if large, may discount the value of the goal (Nishiyama, 2016).…”

Section: Modulators Of Valuating Prioritising Choice Decision-makmentioning

confidence: 99%

Wanting, liking and welfare: The role of affective states in proximate control of behaviour in vertebrates

Gygax

2017

Ethology

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Animals choose a course of action countless times each day. To do so, they need to prioritise their behaviour within a set of alternative actions and decide which of these actions to perform at any one time and for how long, that is, determine when the behaviour has reached its desired effect. This process has classically been called the proximate behavioural control mechanism. Several aspects contribute to this process: internal and external stimuli, the emotions that they elicit, motivation (wants), behavioural goals, valuation, decision‐making and its modulation by mood, and the assessment of behavioural outcomes (liking). I will address all these aspects in the form of an integrated conceptual model. In the process of behavioural control, options need to be valued, and I will refer to evidence showing that an affective hedonic process in respect to (future) reward and punishment heavily affects this value. Moreover, I view motivation, the force that finally drives a specific behavioural output, as being primarily influenced by affective states or even corresponding fully to them. Given the feedback in behavioural control by (dis‐)liking outcomes of behaviour, I reason that in respect to welfare it is more important for animals to reach proximate goals than to avoid negative stimuli. All behavioural choices are modulated, and I show how mood, a long‐term affective state, can cause such modulation. Proximate control of behaviour takes place in the brain, and I will briefly discuss how current and future brain research may elucidate how the brain computes these processes. Furthermore, the inclusion of affective states in the conceptual model raises the question of the subjective experience of animals, and I will address some of the important open questions in this area of research. I will conclude that neural studies cannot currently provide a detailed and general theory on the algorithms of proximate behavioural control. In parallel to further developing these approaches, I propose to strengthen a refined ethological approach with a focus on the states of “wanting” and “liking” in ecologically meaningful circumstances and with a strong ontogenetic (within species) and comparative (between species) component. I consider this ethological approach to be a highly promising step in understanding proximate behavioural control.

show abstract

“…Further research in clinical settings may extend the presented study to take into account not only heterogeneity of brain damage referring to different lobes, but also the within-lobe heterogeneity. Another aspect that might be interesting to include in future studies is other types of reward devaluation, for example effort discounting (Klein-Flügge, Kennerley, Saraiva, Penny, & Bestmann, 2015;Mitchell, 2004;Nishiyama, 2016;Ostaszewski, Bąbel & Swebodziński, 2013). It has been demonstrated that delay and effort discounting share areas that are involved in reward value encoding, but they simultaneously utilize other cortical areas to derive subjective value (Massar et al, 2015).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%