Evidence accumulation in decision making: Unifying the “take the best” and the “rational” models

Laboratory studies of abstract, highly controlled tasks point towards noisy evidence accumulation as a key mechanism governing decision making. Yet it is unclear whether the cognitive processes implicated in simple, isolated decisions in the lab are as paramount to decisions that are ingrained in more complex behaviors, such as driving. Here we aim to address the gap between modern cognitive models of decision making and studies of naturalistic decision making in drivers, which so far have provided only limited insight into the underlying cognitive processes. We investigate drivers' decision making during unprotected left turns, and model the cognitive process driving these decisions. Our model builds on the classical drift-diffusion model, and emphasizes, first, the drift rate linked to the relevant perceptual quantities dynamically sampled from the environment, and, second, collapsing decision boundaries reflecting the dynamic constraints imposed on the decision maker’s response by the environment. We show that the model explains the observed decision outcomes and response times, as well as substantial individual differences in those. Through cross-validation, we demonstrate that the model not only explains the data, but also generalizes to out-of-sample conditions, effectively providing a way to predict human drivers’ behavior in real time. Our results reveal the cognitive mechanisms of gap acceptance decisions in human drivers, and exemplify how simple cognitive process models can help us to understand human behavior in complex real-world tasks.

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An evidence accumulation model of perceptual discrimination with naturalistic stimuli

10.31234/osf.io/zr8wd ◽

2018 ◽

Author(s):

Hector Palada ◽

Rachel A Searston ◽

Annabel Persson ◽

Timothy Ballard ◽

Matthew B Thompson

Keyword(s):

Decision Making ◽

Cognitive Processes ◽

Decision Process ◽

Dynamic Decision Making ◽

Evidence Accumulation ◽

Natural Stimuli ◽

Perceptual Judgments ◽

Linear Ballistic Accumulator ◽

Decision Making Model ◽

Speed Accuracy

Evidence accumulation models have been used to describe the cognitive processes underlying performance in tasks involving two-choice decisions about unidimensional stimuli, such as motion or orientation. Given the multidimensionality of natural stimuli, however, we might expect qualitatively different patterns of evidence accumulation in more applied perceptual tasks. One domain that relies heavily on human decisions about complex natural stimuli is fingerprint discrimination. We know little about the ability of evidence accumulation models to account for the dynamic decision process of a fingerprint examiner resolving if two different prints belong to the same finger or not. Here, we apply a dynamic decision-making model — the linear ballistic accumulator (LBA) — to fingerprint discrimination decisions in order to gain insight into the cognitive processes underlying these complex perceptual judgments. Across three experiments, we show that the LBA provides an accurate description of the fingerprint discrimination decision process with manipulations in visual noise, speed-accuracy emphasis, and training. Our results demonstrate that the LBA is a promising model for furthering our understanding of applied decision-making with naturally varying visual stimuli.

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Autocorrelation structure at rest predicts value correlates of single neurons during reward-guided choice

eLife ◽

10.7554/elife.18937 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 5 ◽

Cited By ~ 34

Author(s):

Sean E Cavanagh ◽

Joni D Wallis ◽

Steven W Kennerley ◽

Laurence T Hunt

Keyword(s):

Decision Making ◽

Prefrontal Cortex ◽

Orbitofrontal Cortex ◽

Receptive Fields ◽

Neural Mechanism ◽

Spike Rate ◽

Accumulation Process ◽

Single Neurons ◽

Evidence Accumulation ◽

Autocorrelation Structure

Correlates of value are routinely observed in the prefrontal cortex (PFC) during reward-guided decision making. In previous work (Hunt et al., 2015), we argued that PFC correlates of chosen value are a consequence of varying rates of a dynamical evidence accumulation process. Yet within PFC, there is substantial variability in chosen value correlates across individual neurons. Here we show that this variability is explained by neurons having different temporal receptive fields of integration, indexed by examining neuronal spike rate autocorrelation structure whilst at rest. We find that neurons with protracted resting temporal receptive fields exhibit stronger chosen value correlates during choice. Within orbitofrontal cortex, these neurons also sustain coding of chosen value from choice through the delivery of reward, providing a potential neural mechanism for maintaining predictions and updating stored values during learning. These findings reveal that within PFC, variability in temporal specialisation across neurons predicts involvement in specific decision-making computations.

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Disentangling the origins of confidence in speeded perceptual judgments through multimodal imaging

10.1101/496877 ◽

2018 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

Michael Pereira ◽

Nathan Faivre ◽

Iñaki Iturrate ◽

Marco Wirthlin ◽

Luana Serafini ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Decision Making ◽

Prefrontal Cortex ◽

Healthy Volunteers ◽

Multimodal Imaging ◽

Inferior Frontal Gyrus ◽

Anterior Insula ◽

Generative Model ◽

Evidence Accumulation ◽

Perceptual Judgments ◽

Anterior Prefrontal Cortex

AbstractThe human capacity to compute the likelihood that a decision is correct - known as metacognition - has proven difficult to study in isolation as it usually co-occurs with decision-making. Here, we isolated post-decisional from decisional contributions to metacognition by combining a novel paradigm with multimodal imaging. Healthy volunteers reported their confidence in the accuracy of decisions they made or decisions they observed. We found better metacognitive performance for committed vs. observed decisions, indicating that committing to a decision informs confidence. Relying on concurrent electroencephalography and hemodynamic recordings, we found a common correlate of confidence following committed and observed decisions in the inferior frontal gyrus, and a dissociation in the anterior prefrontal cortex and anterior insula. We discuss these results in light of decisional and post-decisional accounts of confidence, and propose a generative model of confidence in which metacognitive performance naturally improves when evidence accumulation is constrained upon committing a decision.

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Pupil-Linked Arousal Biases Evidence Accumulation Toward Desirable Percepts During Perceptual Decision-Making

Psychological Science ◽

10.1177/09567976211004547 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 32 (9) ◽

pp. 1494-1509

Author(s):

Yuan Chang Leong ◽

Roma Dziembaj ◽

Mark D’Esposito

Keyword(s):

Decision Making ◽

Computational Models ◽

Perceptual Decision Making ◽

Categorization Task ◽

Perceptual Decision ◽

Evidence Accumulation ◽

Perceptual Judgments ◽

Significant Events ◽

Arousal System ◽

Objective Representation

People’s perceptual reports are biased toward percepts they are motivated to see. The arousal system coordinates the body’s response to motivationally significant events and is well positioned to regulate motivational effects on perceptual judgments. However, it remains unclear whether arousal would enhance or reduce motivational biases. Here, we measured pupil dilation as a measure of arousal while participants ( N = 38) performed a visual categorization task. We used monetary bonuses to motivate participants to perceive one category over another. Even though the reward-maximizing strategy was to perform the task accurately, participants were more likely to report seeing the desirable category. Furthermore, higher arousal levels were associated with making motivationally biased responses. Analyses using computational models suggested that arousal enhanced motivational effects by biasing evidence accumulation in favor of desirable percepts. These results suggest that heightened arousal biases people toward what they want to see and away from an objective representation of the environment.

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Supplemental Material for Fast Evidence Accumulation in Social Anxiety Disorder Enhances Decision Making in a Probabilistic Reward Task

Emotion ◽

10.1037/emo0001053.supp ◽

2021 ◽

Keyword(s):

Decision Making ◽

Anxiety Disorder ◽

Social Anxiety ◽

Social Anxiety Disorder ◽

Evidence Accumulation

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Catecholamine Modulation of Evidence Accumulation during Perceptual Decision Formation: A Randomized Trial

Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience ◽

10.1162/jocn_a_01393 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 31 (7) ◽

pp. 1044-1053 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

Gerard M. Loughnane ◽

Méadhbh B. Brosnan ◽

Jessica J. M. Barnes ◽

Angela Dean ◽

Sanjay L. Nandam ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Decision Making ◽

Behavioral Effect ◽

Oddball Paradigm ◽

Perceptual Decision Making ◽

Neural Basis ◽

Perceptual Decision ◽

Evidence Accumulation ◽

Double Blinded ◽

The Impact ◽

Catecholamine Levels

Recent behavioral modeling and pupillometry studies suggest that neuromodulatory arousal systems play a role in regulating decision formation but neurophysiological support for these observations is lacking. We employed a randomized, double-blinded, placebo-controlled, crossover design to probe the impact of pharmacological enhancement of catecholamine levels on perceptual decision-making. Catecholamine levels were manipulated using the clinically relevant drugs methylphenidate and atomoxetine, and their effects were compared with those of citalopram and placebo. Participants performed a classic EEG oddball paradigm that elicits the P3b, a centro-parietal potential that has been shown to trace evidence accumulation, under each of the four drug conditions. We found that methylphenidate and atomoxetine administration shortened RTs to the oddball targets. The neural basis of this behavioral effect was an earlier P3b peak latency, driven specifically by an increase in its buildup rate without any change in its time of onset or peak amplitude. This study provides neurophysiological evidence for the catecholaminergic enhancement of a discrete aspect of human decision-making, that is, evidence accumulation. Our results also support theoretical accounts suggesting that catecholamines may enhance cognition via increases in neural gain.

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