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Bustamante LA, Barch DM, Solis J, Oshinowo T, Grahek I, Konova AB, Daw ND, Cohen JD. Major depression symptom severity associations with willingness to exert effort and patch foraging strategy. MEDRXIV : THE PREPRINT SERVER FOR HEALTH SCIENCES 2024:2024.02.18.24302985. [PMID: 38947009 PMCID: PMC11213125 DOI: 10.1101/2024.02.18.24302985] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 07/02/2024]
Abstract
Individuals with major depressive disorder (MDD) can experience reduced motivation and cognitive function, leading to challenges with goal-directed behavior. When selecting goals, people maximize 'expected value' by selecting actions that maximize potential reward while minimizing associated costs, including effort 'costs' and the opportunity cost of time. In MDD, differential weighing of costs and benefits are theorized mechanisms underlying changes in goal-directed cognition and may contribute to symptom heterogeneity. We used the Effort Foraging Task to quantify cognitive and physical effort costs, and patch leaving thresholds in low effort conditions (hypothesized to reflect perceived opportunity cost of time) and investigated their shared versus distinct relationships to clinical features in participants with MDD (N=52, 43 in-episode) and comparisons (N=27). Contrary to our predictions, none of the decision-making measures differed with MDD diagnosis. However, each of the measures were related to symptom severity, over and above effects of ability (i.e., performance). Greater anxiety symptoms were selectively associated with lower cognitive effort cost (i.e. greater willingness to exert effort). Anhedonia symptoms were associated with increased physical effort costs. Finally, greater physical anergia was related to decreased patch leaving thresholds. Markers of effort-based decision-making may inform understanding of MDD heterogeneity. Increased willingness to exert cognitive effort may contribute to anxiety symptoms such as rumination and worry. The association of decreased leaving thresholds with symptom severity is consistent with reward rate-based accounts of reduced vigor in MDD. Future research should address subtypes of depression with or without anxiety, which may relate differentially to cognitive effort decisions.
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Neville V, Mendl M, Paul ES, Seriès P, Dayan P. A primer on the use of computational modelling to investigate affective states, affective disorders and animal welfare in non-human animals. COGNITIVE, AFFECTIVE & BEHAVIORAL NEUROSCIENCE 2024; 24:370-383. [PMID: 38036937 PMCID: PMC11039423 DOI: 10.3758/s13415-023-01137-w] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 10/30/2023] [Indexed: 12/02/2023]
Abstract
Objective measures of animal emotion-like and mood-like states are essential for preclinical studies of affective disorders and for assessing the welfare of laboratory and other animals. However, the development and validation of measures of these affective states poses a challenge partly because the relationships between affect and its behavioural, physiological and cognitive signatures are complex. Here, we suggest that the crisp characterisations offered by computational modelling of the underlying, but unobservable, processes that mediate these signatures should provide better insights. Although this computational psychiatry approach has been widely used in human research in both health and disease, translational computational psychiatry studies remain few and far between. We explain how building computational models with data from animal studies could play a pivotal role in furthering our understanding of the aetiology of affective disorders, associated affective states and the likely underlying cognitive processes involved. We end by outlining the basic steps involved in a simple computational analysis.
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Affiliation(s)
- Vikki Neville
- Bristol Veterinary School, University of Bristol, Langford, UK.
| | - Michael Mendl
- Bristol Veterinary School, University of Bristol, Langford, UK
| | | | - Peggy Seriès
- Institute for Adaptive and Neural Computation, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK
| | - Peter Dayan
- Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics & University of Tübingen, Tübingen, Germany
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Krupnik V. I like therefore I can, and I can therefore I like: the role of self-efficacy and affect in active inference of allostasis. Front Neural Circuits 2024; 18:1283372. [PMID: 38322807 PMCID: PMC10839114 DOI: 10.3389/fncir.2024.1283372] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/25/2023] [Accepted: 01/02/2024] [Indexed: 02/08/2024] Open
Abstract
Active inference (AIF) is a theory of the behavior of information-processing open dynamic systems. It describes them as generative models (GM) generating inferences on the causes of sensory input they receive from their environment. Based on these inferences, GMs generate predictions about sensory input. The discrepancy between a prediction and the actual input results in prediction error. GMs then execute action policies predicted to minimize the prediction error. The free-energy principle provides a rationale for AIF by stipulating that information-processing open systems must constantly minimize their free energy (through suppressing the cumulative prediction error) to avoid decay. The theory of homeostasis and allostasis has a similar logic. Homeostatic set points are expectations of living organisms. Discrepancies between set points and actual states generate stress. For optimal functioning, organisms avoid stress by preserving homeostasis. Theories of AIF and homeostasis have recently converged, with AIF providing a formal account for homeo- and allostasis. In this paper, we present bacterial chemotaxis as molecular AIF, where mutual constraints by extero- and interoception play an essential role in controlling bacterial behavior supporting homeostasis. Extending this insight to the brain, we propose a conceptual model of the brain homeostatic GM, in which we suggest partition of the brain GM into cognitive and physiological homeostatic GMs. We outline their mutual regulation as well as their integration based on the free-energy principle. From this analysis, affect and self-efficacy emerge as the main regulators of the cognitive homeostatic GM. We suggest fatigue and depression as target neurocognitive phenomena for studying the neural mechanisms of such regulation.
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Affiliation(s)
- Valery Krupnik
- Department of Mental Health, Naval Hospital Camp Pendleton, Camp Pendleton, Oceanside, CA, United States
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Heerema R, Carrillo P, Daunizeau J, Vinckier F, Pessiglione M. Mood fluctuations shift cost-benefit tradeoffs in economic decisions. Sci Rep 2023; 13:18173. [PMID: 37875525 PMCID: PMC10598198 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-023-45217-w] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/13/2023] [Accepted: 10/17/2023] [Indexed: 10/26/2023] Open
Abstract
Mood effects on economic choice seem blatantly irrational, but might rise from mechanisms adapted to natural environments. We have proposed a theory in which mood helps adapting the behaviour to statistical dependencies in the environment, by biasing the expected value of foraging actions (which involve taking risk, spending time and making effort to get more reward). Here, we tested the existence of this mechanism, using an established mood induction paradigm combined with independent economic choices that opposed small but uncostly rewards to larger but costly rewards (involving either risk, delay or effort). To maximise the sensitivity to mood fluctuations, we developed an algorithm ensuring that choice options were continuously adjusted to subjective indifference points. In 102 participants tested twice, we found that during episodes of positive mood (relative to negative mood), choices were biased towards better rewarded but costly options, irrespective of the cost type. Computational modelling confirmed that the incidental mood effect was best explained by a bias added to the expected value of costly options, prior to decision making. This bias is therefore automatically applied even in artificial environments where it is not adaptive, allowing mood to spill over many sorts of decisions and generate irrational behaviours.
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Affiliation(s)
- Roeland Heerema
- Motivation, Brain and Behavior (MBB) Lab, Paris Brain Institute (ICM), Pitié-Salpêtrière Hospital, 75013, Paris, France.
- Sorbonne Université, Inserm U1127, CNRS U7225, 75013, Paris, France.
| | - Pablo Carrillo
- Motivation, Brain and Behavior (MBB) Lab, Paris Brain Institute (ICM), Pitié-Salpêtrière Hospital, 75013, Paris, France
- Sorbonne Université, Inserm U1127, CNRS U7225, 75013, Paris, France
| | - Jean Daunizeau
- Motivation, Brain and Behavior (MBB) Lab, Paris Brain Institute (ICM), Pitié-Salpêtrière Hospital, 75013, Paris, France
- Sorbonne Université, Inserm U1127, CNRS U7225, 75013, Paris, France
| | - Fabien Vinckier
- Motivation, Brain and Behavior (MBB) Lab, Paris Brain Institute (ICM), Pitié-Salpêtrière Hospital, 75013, Paris, France
- Sorbonne Université, Inserm U1127, CNRS U7225, 75013, Paris, France
- Université Paris Cité, 75006, Paris, France
- Department of Psychiatry, Service Hospitalo-Universitaire, GHU Paris Psychiatrie and Neurosciences, 75014, Paris, France
| | - Mathias Pessiglione
- Motivation, Brain and Behavior (MBB) Lab, Paris Brain Institute (ICM), Pitié-Salpêtrière Hospital, 75013, Paris, France.
- Sorbonne Université, Inserm U1127, CNRS U7225, 75013, Paris, France.
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Barch DM, Culbreth AJ, Ben Zeev D, Campbell A, Nepal S, Moran EK. Dissociation of Cognitive Effort-Based Decision Making and Its Associations With Symptoms, Cognition, and Everyday Life Function Across Schizophrenia, Bipolar Disorder, and Depression. Biol Psychiatry 2023; 94:501-510. [PMID: 37080416 PMCID: PMC10755814 DOI: 10.1016/j.biopsych.2023.04.007] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/25/2023] [Revised: 04/05/2023] [Accepted: 04/06/2023] [Indexed: 04/22/2023]
Abstract
BACKGROUND Anhedonia and amotivation are symptoms of many different mental health disorders that are frequently associated with functional disability, but it is not clear whether the same processes contribute to motivational impairments across disorders. This study focused on one possible factor, the willingness to exert cognitive effort, referred to as cognitive effort-cost decision making. METHODS We examined performance on the deck choice task as a measure of cognitive effort-cost decision making, in which people choose to complete an easy task for a small monetary reward or a harder task for larger rewards, in 5 groups: healthy control (n = 80), schizophrenia/schizoaffective disorder (n = 50), bipolar disorder with psychosis (n = 58), current major depression (n = 60), and past major depression (n = 51). We examined cognitive effort-cost decision making in relation to clinician and self-reported motivation symptoms, working memory and cognitive control performance, and life function measured by ecological momentary assessment and passive sensing. RESULTS We found a significant diagnostic group × reward interaction (F8,588 = 4.37, p < .001, ηp2 = 0.056). Compared with the healthy control group, the schizophrenia/schizoaffective and bipolar disorder groups, but not the current or past major depressive disorder groups, showed a reduced willingness to exert effort at the higher reward values. In the schizophrenia/schizoaffective and bipolar disorder groups, but not the major depressive disorder groups, reduced willingness to exert cognitive effort for higher rewards was associated with greater clinician-rated motivation impairments, worse working memory and cognitive control performance, and less engagement in goal-directed activities measured by ecological momentary assessment. CONCLUSIONS These findings suggest that the mechanisms contributing to motivational impairments differ among individuals with psychosis spectrum disorders versus depression.
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Affiliation(s)
- Deanna M Barch
- Department of Psychological & Brain Sciences, Washington University in St. Louis, St. Louis, Missouri; Department of Psychiatry, Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis, Missouri; Department of Radiology, Mallinckrodt Institute of Radiology, Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis, Missouri.
| | - Adam J Culbreth
- Maryland Psychiatric Research Center, Department of Psychiatry, University of Maryland, Baltimore, Maryland
| | - Dror Ben Zeev
- Department of Psychiatry, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington
| | - Andrew Campbell
- Department of Computer Science, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire
| | - Subigya Nepal
- Department of Computer Science, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire
| | - Erin K Moran
- Department of Psychological & Brain Sciences, Washington University in St. Louis, St. Louis, Missouri
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Blouzard E, Pouchon A, Polosan M, Bastin J, Dondé C. Effort-Cost Decision-making Among Individuals With Schizophrenia: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis. JAMA Psychiatry 2023; 80:548-557. [PMID: 37043223 PMCID: PMC10099175 DOI: 10.1001/jamapsychiatry.2023.0553] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/20/2022] [Accepted: 01/31/2023] [Indexed: 04/13/2023]
Abstract
Importance Motivational impairments in schizophrenia are by definition associated with poor outcome. It is postulated that the reduction of goal-directed behavior arises from abnormal trade-offs between rewards and efforts. Objective To examine whether schizophrenia is associated with impairments in effort-cost decision-making. Data Sources For this systematic review and meta-analysis, the PubMed, ScienceDirect, PsycINFO, Embase, and ClinicalTrials.gov databases were searched from inception to July 2022 for studies that investigated effort-cost decision-making in schizophrenia. Search terms included effort, cost, and schizophrenia. Study Selection Consensual criteria for inclusion were peer-reviewed studies published in English that used a computerized effort-cost decision-making behavioral paradigm and compared individuals with schizophrenia with control individuals. Data Extraction and Synthesis The Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-analyses reporting guideline was used for abstracting data. Data were extracted independently by 2 authors and then pooled using random-effects sizes and bayesian approaches. Main Outcomes and Measures The main outcomes were performance on effort-cost decision-making tasks requiring an effort-reward trade-off, measured by Hedges g effect size. Effects of moderators were tested with meta-regressions and subgroup analyses. Results Twenty studies involving 1503 participants were included: 837 individuals with schizophrenia (541 [64.6%] male; mean [SD] age, 35.89 [6.70] years) and 666 control individuals without schizophrenia (360 [54.1%] male; mean [SD] age, 34.16 [5.92] years). Participants with schizophrenia had significantly reduced willingness to expend effort for rewards compared with controls (k = 20; effect size, 0.43; 95% CI, 0.30-0.56; P < .001; I2 = 33.1%; Q test P = .08). The magnitude of the deficit was significantly greater for high-reward trials. The severity of negative symptoms was negatively associated with effort-cost decision-making (k = 8; effect size, -0.33; 95% CI, -0.50 to -0.15; P < .001), while participants with a high number of negative symptoms had a significantly larger impairment in effort-cost decision-making (k = 5; effect size, 0.47; 95% CI, 0.10-0.84; P = .01). Conclusions and Relevance In this systematic review and meta-analysis, schizophrenia was associated with deficits in effort allocation as indexed by effort-cost decision-making tasks. Understanding the cognitive and neurobiological mechanisms driving effort allocation impairments may assist in developing novel interventions.
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Affiliation(s)
- Elodie Blouzard
- University Grenoble Alpes, Inserm, Grenoble Institut Neurosciences, Grenoble, France
| | - Arnaud Pouchon
- University Grenoble Alpes, Inserm, Grenoble Institut Neurosciences, Grenoble, France
- Adult Psychiatry Department, CHU Grenoble Alpes, Grenoble, France
| | - Mircea Polosan
- University Grenoble Alpes, Inserm, Grenoble Institut Neurosciences, Grenoble, France
- Adult Psychiatry Department, CHU Grenoble Alpes, Grenoble, France
| | - Julien Bastin
- University Grenoble Alpes, Inserm, Grenoble Institut Neurosciences, Grenoble, France
| | - Clément Dondé
- University Grenoble Alpes, Inserm, Grenoble Institut Neurosciences, Grenoble, France
- Adult Psychiatry Department, CHU Grenoble Alpes, Grenoble, France
- Adult Psychiatry Department, Centre Hospitalier Alpes-Isère, Saint-Egrève, France
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Madur L, Ineichen C, Bergamini G, Greter A, Poggi G, Cuomo-Haymour N, Sigrist H, Sych Y, Paterna JC, Bornemann KD, Viollet C, Fernandez-Albert F, Alanis-Lobato G, Hengerer B, Pryce CR. Stress deficits in reward behaviour are associated with and replicated by dysregulated amygdala-nucleus accumbens pathway function in mice. Commun Biol 2023; 6:422. [PMID: 37061616 PMCID: PMC10105726 DOI: 10.1038/s42003-023-04811-4] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/21/2022] [Accepted: 04/05/2023] [Indexed: 04/17/2023] Open
Abstract
Reduced reward interest/learning and reward-to-effort valuation are distinct, common symptoms in neuropsychiatric disorders for which chronic stress is a major aetiological factor. Glutamate neurons in basal amygdala (BA) project to various regions including nucleus accumbens (NAc). The BA-NAc neural pathway is activated by reward and aversion, with many neurons being monovalent. In adult male mice, chronic social stress (CSS) leads to reduced discriminative reward learning (DRL) associated with decreased BA-NAc activity, and to reduced reward-to-effort valuation (REV) associated, in contrast, with increased BA-NAc activity. Chronic tetanus toxin BA-NAc inhibition replicates the CSS-DRL effect and causes a mild REV reduction, whilst chronic DREADDs BA-NAc activation replicates the CSS effect on REV without affecting DRL. This study provides evidence that stress disruption of reward processing involves the BA-NAc neural pathway; the bi-directional effects implicate opposite activity changes in reward (learning) neurons and aversion (effort) neurons in the BA-NAc pathway following chronic stress.
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Affiliation(s)
- Lorraine Madur
- Preclinical Laboratory, Department of Psychiatry, Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, Psychiatric University Hospital Zürich (PUK) and University of Zurich (UZH), Zurich, Switzerland
- Zurich Neuroscience Center, University of Zurich and ETH Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
| | - Christian Ineichen
- Preclinical Laboratory, Department of Psychiatry, Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, Psychiatric University Hospital Zürich (PUK) and University of Zurich (UZH), Zurich, Switzerland
| | - Giorgio Bergamini
- Preclinical Laboratory, Department of Psychiatry, Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, Psychiatric University Hospital Zürich (PUK) and University of Zurich (UZH), Zurich, Switzerland
| | - Alexandra Greter
- Preclinical Laboratory, Department of Psychiatry, Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, Psychiatric University Hospital Zürich (PUK) and University of Zurich (UZH), Zurich, Switzerland
| | - Giulia Poggi
- Preclinical Laboratory, Department of Psychiatry, Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, Psychiatric University Hospital Zürich (PUK) and University of Zurich (UZH), Zurich, Switzerland
| | - Nagiua Cuomo-Haymour
- Preclinical Laboratory, Department of Psychiatry, Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, Psychiatric University Hospital Zürich (PUK) and University of Zurich (UZH), Zurich, Switzerland
- Zurich Neuroscience Center, University of Zurich and ETH Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
| | - Hannes Sigrist
- Preclinical Laboratory, Department of Psychiatry, Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, Psychiatric University Hospital Zürich (PUK) and University of Zurich (UZH), Zurich, Switzerland
| | - Yaroslav Sych
- Institute of Cellular and Integrative Neuroscience, University of Strasbourg, Strasbourg, France
| | | | - Klaus D Bornemann
- CNS Diseases Research, Boehringer Ingelheim Pharma GmbH & Co. KG, Biberach, Germany
| | - Coralie Viollet
- Global Computational Biology and Digital Sciences, Boehringer Ingelheim Pharma GmbH & Co. KG, Biberach, Germany
| | - Francesc Fernandez-Albert
- Global Computational Biology and Digital Sciences, Boehringer Ingelheim Pharma GmbH & Co. KG, Biberach, Germany
| | - Gregorio Alanis-Lobato
- Global Computational Biology and Digital Sciences, Boehringer Ingelheim Pharma GmbH & Co. KG, Biberach, Germany
| | - Bastian Hengerer
- CNS Diseases Research, Boehringer Ingelheim Pharma GmbH & Co. KG, Biberach, Germany
| | - Christopher R Pryce
- Preclinical Laboratory, Department of Psychiatry, Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, Psychiatric University Hospital Zürich (PUK) and University of Zurich (UZH), Zurich, Switzerland.
- Zurich Neuroscience Center, University of Zurich and ETH Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland.
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