ArticleeLife2015
Serotonergic neurons signal reward and punishment on multiple timescales.
Article in eLife, 2015. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 205 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Who cites it
205 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 398 citations in OpenAlex.
- Differential Associations of Dopamine and Serotonin With Reward and Punishment Processes in Humans: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.JAMA psychiatry · 2025Pooled it
- Modulation of anterior cingulate cortex reward and penalty signalling in medication-naive young-adult subjects with depressive symptoms following acute dose lurasidone.Psychological medicine · 2019Trial
- Beyond negative valence: 2-week administration of a serotonergic antidepressant enhances both reward and effort learning signals.PLoS biology · 2017Trial
- Serotonin biology as a basis for explaining psychedelic drug action.Current biology : CB · 2026Review
- Effects of oxycodone on tonic levels and phasic release of serotonin in the rat nucleus accumbens core.Bioelectrochemistry (Amsterdam, Netherlands) · 2026Article
- Neurofeedback, Biofeedback, and Basic Learning Theory: Revisiting the 2011 Conceptual Framework.Applied psychophysiology and biofeedback · 2026Review
- Prefrontal Neurons Projecting to the Dorsomedial Striatum and Insular Cortex Support Reward Learning.Neuroscience bulletin · 2026Article
- Serotonergic modulation of motor subspace dynamics drives a sleep-independent quiescent state.eLife · 2026Article
- Serotonin-endocannabinoid crosstalk selectively regulates inhibitory GABAergic inputs in the medial prefrontal cortex.Neuropsychopharmacology : official publication of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology · 2026Article
- Rapid dynamics of dorsal raphe serotonin neurons regulate the strength of visual attention.Nature communications · 2026Article
- Intestinal pathogens override hunger-driven decision-making via immune regulation of central serotonin signaling in C. elegans.Nature communications · 2026Article
- Activity in human dorsal raphe nucleus signals changes in behavioural policy.Nature communications · 2026Article
- Impact of distinct neurotransmitter release modes on neuronal signaling.Molecular psychiatry · 2026Review
- Voltage imaging in zebrafish using high-speed light-sheet microscopy.Neurophotonics · 2026Review
- Neural signaling mechanisms in depression: bridging classical monoamine hypotheses, animal models, and emerging antidepressant strategies.Frontiers in cell and developmental biology · 2026Review
- Dopamine and serotonin neurotransmissions exert complementary control over primate approach and avoidance.Translational psychiatry · 2025Article
- Increased c-Fos immunoreactivity in anxiety-related brain regions following paroxetine discontinuation.Neuropharmacology · 2025Article
- Tachykinin 1-expressing neurons in the lateral habenula signal negative reward prediction error.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2025Article
- Concerted actions of distinct serotonin neurons orchestrate female pup care behavior.Research square · 2025Article
- Concerted actions of distinct serotonin neurons orchestrate female pup care behavior.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2025Article
145 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
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Authors and funding
3 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
Serotonin's function in the brain is unclear. One challenge in testing the numerous hypotheses about serotonin's function has been observing the activity of identified serotonergic neurons in animals engaged in behavioral tasks. We recorded the activity of dorsal raphe neurons while mice experienced a task in which rewards and punishments varied across blocks of trials. We 'tagged' serotonergic neurons with the light-sensitive protein channelrhodopsin-2 and identified them based on their responses to light. We found three main features of serotonergic neuron activity: (1) a large fraction of serotonergic neurons modulated their tonic firing rates over the course of minutes during reward vs punishment blocks; (2) most were phasically excited by punishments; and (3) a subset was phasically excited by reward-predicting cues. By contrast, dopaminergic neurons did not show firing rate changes across blocks of trials. These results suggest that serotonergic neurons signal information about reward and punishment on multiple timescales.
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Registered trials
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.