Evidence map›Paper›PMID 34060875›Full record

ArticleBehavioral neuroscience2021

The case against economic values in the orbitofrontal cortex (or anywhere else in the brain).

Benjamin Y Hayden, Yael Niv

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in Behavioral neuroscience, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 59 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
59citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

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.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

59 citing papers in PubMed.

  1. Article
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  5. Phenomenal interface theory: a model for basal consciousness.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2025
    Article
  6. Article
  7. The interoceptive origin of reinforcement learning.Trends in cognitive sciences · 2025
    Review
  8. Review
  9. Article
  10. Article
  11. Review
  12. Article
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  14. Review
  15. Review
  16. Incomparability and Incommensurability in Choice: No Common Currency of Value?Perspectives on psychological science : a journal of the Association for Psychological Science · 2024
    Article
  17. Article
  18. Article
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  20. Article
4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

2 authors.

Benjamin Y HaydenCenter for Neuroengineering, University of Minnesota.
Yael NivPrinceton Neuroscience Institute, Princeton University.ORCID 0000-0002-0259-8371

Funding

NEURONAL BASIS OF PERSISTENCER01DA038615 · NIDA · UNIVERSITY OF ROCHESTER · PI HAYDEN, BENJAMIN Y · 2015 to 2024
$3.4M
Orbitofrontal cortex as a cognitive map of task statesR01DA042065 · NIDA · PRINCETON UNIVERSITY · PI NIV, YAEL · 2016 to 2020
$1.8M
John Templeton FoundationNIDA NIH HHS R01 DA038615NIDA NIH HHS R01 DA042065
6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Much of traditional neuroeconomics proceeds from the hypothesis that value is reified in the brain, that is, that there are neurons or brain regions whose responses serve the discrete purpose of encoding value. This hypothesis is supported by the finding that the activity of many neurons covaries with subjective value as estimated in specific tasks, and has led to the idea that the primary function of the orbitofrontal cortex is to compute and signal economic value. Here we consider an alternative: That economic value, in the cardinal, common-currency sense, is not represented in the brain and used for choice by default. This idea is motivated by consideration of the economic concept of value, which places important epistemic constraints on our ability to identify its neural basis. It is also motivated by the behavioral economics literature, especially work on heuristics, which proposes value-free process models for much if not all of choice. Finally, it is buoyed by recent neural and behavioral findings regarding how animals and humans learn to choose between options. In light of our hypothesis, we critically reevaluate putative neural evidence for the representation of value and explore an alternative: direct learning of action policies. We delineate how this alternative can provide a robust account of behavior that concords with existing empirical data. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).

Indexed as

Choice BehaviorPrefrontal CortexAnimalsBrainHumansNeurons

Identifiers

PMID34060875
PMCPMC12398331

What OpenQuestion holds

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Registered trials

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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.