ArticleThe Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience2012
Separate prefrontal-subcortical circuits mediate different components of risk-based decision making.
Article in The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience, 2012. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 101 papers.
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Who cites it
101 citing papers in PubMed.
- Anterior cingulate cortex activation of claustrum projection neuron subtypes is enhanced by alcohol.Neuropharmacology · 2026Article
- Optogenetic inhibition reveals distinct contributions of medial prefrontal cortex to intertemporal choice in young and aged rats.Cerebral cortex (New York, N.Y. : 1991) · 2025Article
- Disrupted decision making in adult male rats after prolonged withdrawal from ethanol vapor exposure.Alcohol, clinical & experimental research · 2025Article
- Noninvasive ventromedial prefrontal cortex stimulation can enhance and impair affective learning from rewarding and threatening stimuli.Social cognitive and affective neuroscience · 2025Article
- Effects of maternal separation on punishment-driven risky decision making in adolescence and adulthood.Neurobiology of learning and memory · 2025Article
- Neural mechanisms of maladaptive risk decision-making across psychiatric disorders.Frontiers in behavioral neuroscience · 2025Review
- Acute stress differentially alters reward-related decision making and inhibitory control under threat of punishment.Neurobiology of stress · 2024Review
- A special role for anterior cingulate cortex, but not orbitofrontal cortex or basolateral amygdala, in choices involving information.Cerebral cortex (New York, N.Y. : 1991) · 2024Article
- Enhanced Risky Choice in Male Rats Elicited by the Acute Pharmacological Stressor Yohimbine Involves Prefrontal Dopamine D1 Receptor Activation.The international journal of neuropsychopharmacology · 2024Article
- Toluene alters the intrinsic excitability and excitatory synaptic transmission of basolateral amygdala neurons.Frontiers in neuroscience · 2024Article
- Alterations in the white matter structure of major depressive disorder patients and their link to childhood trauma.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2024Article
- The Effects of the Inhalant Toluene on Cognitive Function and Behavioral Flexibility: A Review of Recent Findings.Addiction neuroscience · 2023Article
- Temporal Dynamics Underlying Prelimbic Prefrontal Cortical Regulation of Action Selection and Outcome Evaluation during Risk/Reward Decision-Making.The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience · 2023Article
- Emotional Memory Processing during REM Sleep with Implications for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience · 2023Article
- Regulation of sex differences in risk-based decision making by gonadal hormones: Insights from rodent models.Behavioural processes · 2022Review
- Behavior of Rats in a Self-Paced Risky Decision-Making Task Based on Definite Probability.Brain sciences · 2022Article
- Cannabinoid receptor type 1 antagonists alter aspects of risk/reward decision making independent of toluene-mediated effects.Psychopharmacology · 2022Article
- Distinct Medial Orbitofrontal-Striatal Circuits Support Dissociable Component Processes of Risk/Reward Decision-Making.The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience · 2022Article
- Prefrontal Dopaminergic Regulation of Cue-Guided Risky Decision-Making Performance in Rats.Frontiers in behavioral neuroscience · 2022Article
- Probabilistic Reinforcement Learning and Anhedonia.Current topics in behavioral neurosciences · 2022Article
41 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
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Authors and funding
4 authors.
Funding
Abstract
Choosing between smaller, assured rewards or larger, uncertain ones requires reconciliation of competing biases toward more certain or riskier options. We used disconnection and neuroanatomical techniques to reveal that separate, yet interconnected, neural pathways linking the medial prefrontal cortex (PFC), the basolateral amygdala (BLA), and nucleus accumbens (NAc) contribute to these different decision biases in rats. Disrupting communication between the BLA and NAc revealed that this subcortical circuit biases choice toward larger, uncertain rewards on a probabilistic discounting task. In contrast, disconnections between the BLA and PFC increased choice of the Large/Risky option. PFC-NAc disconnections did not affect choice but did increase choice latencies and trial omissions. Neuroanatomical studies confirmed that projection pathways carrying axons from BLA-to-PFC transverse a distinctly different route relative to PFC-to-BLA pathways (via the ventrolateral amydalofugal pathway and ventromedial internal capsule, respectively). We exploited these dissociable axonal pathways to selectively disrupt bottom-up and top-down communication between the BLA and PFC. Subsequent disconnection studies revealed that disruption of top-down (but not bottom-up) information transfer between the medial PFC and BLA increased choice of the larger, riskier option, suggesting that this circuit facilitates tracking of actions and outcomes to temper urges for riskier rewards as they become less profitable. These findings provide novel insight into the dynamic competition between these cortical/subcortical circuits that shape our decision biases and underlie conflicting urges when evaluating options that vary in terms of potential risks and rewards.
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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.