Understanding human decision making from the lens of value signals in the human brain

Summary：Computationofvalueinformationiscriticaltohumandecisionmaking.Howourbrainrepresentsandcomputesvaluesignalsthatarecriticalfordecisionmakinghasreceivedincreasingattentionoverthepastfewyears.Inthistalk,Iwillreporttwoofmyrecentstudiesinvestigatingtheroleoftheorbitofrontalcortex(OFC)inrepresentingsuchsignalsinhumans.Inthefirststudy,weusedintracranialEEG(iEEG)toinvestigatethetemporaldynamicsofexpectedvalue,riskandexperiencedvaluecodinginthehumanorbitofrontalcortex(OFC).Thisstudy,forthefirsttime,provideselectrophysiologicalevidenceforthetemporaldynamicsofthesevaluesignalsandthedistributionsofsuchsignalsinthehumanOFC.Inthesecondstudy,weusedFunctionalMagneticResonanceImaging(fMRI)toinvestigatewhetheranantero-posteriorgradientofexperiencedvaluerepresentationswithinthehumanorbitofrontalcortex(OFC)correspondingtosecondaryvsprimaryrewardsdependedonspecificmorphologicalfeatureswithinthisregionwhichdisplaysconsiderableintersubjectvariability.Wefoundthatthelocalizationsofdistinctexperiencedvaluesignalscanbepredictedfromtheorganizationofthehumanorbitofrontalsulci.Together,thesetwoseriesofstudiesadvanceourunderstandingonnewaspectsoftheroleofthehumanOFCincomputingvalueinformationthatisrequiredforhumandecisionmaking.