The DOI matches its Crossref record; 69 of the 70 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
Not Noisy, Just Wrong: The Role of Suboptimal Inference in Behavioral Variability
Open accessAbstract
Behavior varies from trial to trial even when the stimulus is maintained as constant as possible. In many models, this variability is attributed to noise in the brain. Here, we propose that there is another major source of variability: suboptimal inference. Importantly, we argue that in most tasks of interest, and particularly complex ones, suboptimal inference is likely to be the dominant component of behavioral variability. This perspective explains a variety of intriguing observations, including why variability appears to be larger on the sensory than on the motor side, and why our sensors are sometimes surprisingly unreliable.
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“The representational capacity required exceeds what could plausibly be implemented in neural tissue, particularly for continuous variables with theoretically infinite possible states (Beck et al. 2012; Fiser et al. 2010).”
From The myth of the Bayesian brain (2025) · cites this paper as Beck et al. 2012
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Lieder, F., & Griffiths, T. L. (2020) · Behavioral and Brain Sciences · doi:10.1017/s0140525x1900061x · Cited by 892
Robust speech perception: Recognize the familiar, generalize to the similar, and adapt to the novel.
Kleinschmidt, D., & Jaeger, T. F. (2015) · Psychological Review · doi:10.1037/a0038695 · Cited by 684
Probabilistic brains: knowns and unknowns
Pouget, A., Beck, J. M., Ma, W. J., & Latham, P. E. (2013) · Nature Neuroscience · doi:10.1038/nn.3495 · Cited by 615
“If this is not the case, then the brain must either be adding noise or making approximations (or both 92 ), and the problem is to determine whether approximations are being used and, if so, what they are.”
BackgroundSelf-citationHumans use directed and random exploration to solve the explore–exploit dilemma.
Wilson, R. C., Geana, A., White, J. M., Ludvig, E. A., & Cohen, J. D. (2014) · Journal of Experimental Psychology: General · doi:10.1037/a0038199 · Cited by 580
Information-limiting correlations
Moreno‐Bote, R., Beck, J. M., Kanitscheider, I., Pitkow, X., Latham, P. E., & Pouget, A. (2014) · Nature Neuroscience · doi:10.1038/nn.3807 · Cited by 565
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Metadata
- Authors
- Beck, J. M., Ma, W. J., Pitkow, X., Latham, P. E., & Pouget, A.
- Affiliations
- University of Rochester (US)
- Baylor College of Medicine (US)
- Gatsby Computational Neuroscience Unit (GB)
- University of Geneva (CH)
- Corresponding author
- Pouget, Alexandre
- Venue
- Neuron
- Publisher
- Elsevier BV
- Published
- 2012-04
- Volume
- 74
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 30-39
- ISSN
- 0896-6273 (ISSN-L)
- PMC
- PMC4486264
- OpenAlex
- W2144984120
- Cited by
- 316
- References
- 70
- Citations by year
- 2026: 10 · 2025: 19 · 2024: 25 · 2023: 12 · 2022: 26 · 2021: 22 · 2020: 36 · 2019: 31 · 2018: 22 · 2017: 24 · 2016: 24 · 2015: 22 · 2014: 29 · 2013: 11 · 2012: 3
- FWCI
- 10.51
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- bronze
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- Neuron (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Archive ouverte UNIGE (University of Geneva) (publishedVersion)
- Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (acceptedVersion)
- PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
- Archive ouverte UNIGE (University of Geneva) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
- Funders
- National Science Foundation (0446730, 1132009)
- James S. McDonnell Foundation
- Multidisciplinary University Research Initiative (N00014-07-1-0937)
- National Eye Institute (R01EY020958)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Neural dynamics and brain function
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Neural and Behavioral Psychology Studies
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Motor Control and Adaptation
- Keywords
- behavioral variability, trial-to-trial variability, neural noise, sensory uncertainty, sensor reliability, Bayesian inference, perceptual decision making
- MeSH terms
- Animals, Behavior, Brain, Field Dependence-Independence, Humans, Models, Neurological, Models, Psychological, Neurons, Perceptual Masking, Sensation, Reproducibility of Results, Uncertainty, Behavioral Research
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