ArticleScientific reports2022
Spontaneous instrumental avoidance learning in social contexts.
Article in Scientific reports, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 5 papers.
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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
5 citing papers in PubMed, 17 citations in OpenAlex.
- Kinematic encoding of the speed-accuracy trade-off in approach/avoidance decisions when facing social threats.Psychological research · 2026Article
- Social threat avoidance depends on action-outcome predictability.Communications psychology · 2024Article
- Spontaneous instrumental approach-avoidance learning in social contexts in autism.Molecular autism · 2024Article
- Article
- Piecing together the puzzle of emotional consciousness.Neuroscience of consciousness · 2023Review
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Authors and funding
4 authors at 3 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Adaptation to our social environment requires learning how to avoid potentially harmful situations, such as encounters with aggressive individuals. Threatening facial expressions can evoke automatic stimulus-driven reactions, but whether their aversive motivational value suffices to drive instrumental active avoidance remains unclear. When asked to freely choose between different action alternatives, participants spontaneously-without instruction or monetary reward-developed a preference for choices that maximized the probability of avoiding angry individuals (sitting away from them in a waiting room). Most participants showed clear behavioral signs of instrumental learning, even in the absence of an explicit avoidance strategy. Inter-individual variability in learning depended on participants' subjective evaluations and sensitivity to threat approach feedback. Counterfactual learning best accounted for avoidance behaviors, especially in participants who developed an explicit avoidance strategy. Our results demonstrate that implicit defensive behaviors in social contexts are likely the product of several learning processes, including instrumental learning.
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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.