Global gain modulation generates time-dependent urgency during perceptual choice in humans
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Global gain modulation generates time-dependent urgency during perceptual choice in humans. / Murphy, Peter; Boonstra, Evert; Nieuwenhuis, Sander.
In: NAT COMMUN, Vol. 7, 24.11.2016, p. 13526.Research output: SCORING: Contribution to journal › SCORING: Journal article › Research › peer-review
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TY - JOUR
T1 - Global gain modulation generates time-dependent urgency during perceptual choice in humans
AU - Murphy, Peter
AU - Boonstra, Evert
AU - Nieuwenhuis, Sander
PY - 2016/11/24
Y1 - 2016/11/24
N2 - Decision-makers must often balance the desire to accumulate information with the costs of protracted deliberation. Optimal, reward-maximizing decision-making can require dynamic adjustment of this speed/accuracy trade-off over the course of a single decision. However, it is unclear whether humans are capable of such time-dependent adjustments. Here, we identify several signatures of time-dependency in human perceptual decision-making and highlight their possible neural source. Behavioural and model-based analyses reveal that subjects respond to deadline-induced speed pressure by lowering their criterion on accumulated perceptual evidence as the deadline approaches. In the brain, this effect is reflected in evidence-independent urgency that pushes decision-related motor preparation signals closer to a fixed threshold. Moreover, we show that global modulation of neural gain, as indexed by task-related fluctuations in pupil diameter, is a plausible biophysical mechanism for the generation of this urgency. These findings establish context-sensitive time-dependency as a critical feature of human decision-making.
AB - Decision-makers must often balance the desire to accumulate information with the costs of protracted deliberation. Optimal, reward-maximizing decision-making can require dynamic adjustment of this speed/accuracy trade-off over the course of a single decision. However, it is unclear whether humans are capable of such time-dependent adjustments. Here, we identify several signatures of time-dependency in human perceptual decision-making and highlight their possible neural source. Behavioural and model-based analyses reveal that subjects respond to deadline-induced speed pressure by lowering their criterion on accumulated perceptual evidence as the deadline approaches. In the brain, this effect is reflected in evidence-independent urgency that pushes decision-related motor preparation signals closer to a fixed threshold. Moreover, we show that global modulation of neural gain, as indexed by task-related fluctuations in pupil diameter, is a plausible biophysical mechanism for the generation of this urgency. These findings establish context-sensitive time-dependency as a critical feature of human decision-making.
M3 - SCORING: Journal article
VL - 7
SP - 13526
JO - NAT COMMUN
JF - NAT COMMUN
SN - 2041-1723
ER -