CoChat
Sign Up
Cited by 136Neurotransmitter Receptor Influence on BehaviorNeural and Behavioral Psychology StudiesMemory and Neural Mechanisms

The medial prefrontal cortex shapes dopamine reward prediction errors under state uncertainty

Open access
Starkweather, Clara Kwon, Gershman, Samuel J., Uchida, Naoshige·2018·Neuron
DOI 10.1016/j.neuron.2018.03.036PMC PMC5934341
Open this paper in CoChat — free accountOpen PDF

Abstract

Animals make predictions based on currently available information. In natural settings, sensory cues may not reveal complete information, requiring the animal to infer the "hidden state" of the environment. The brain structures important in hidden state inference remain unknown. A previous study showed that midbrain dopamine neurons exhibit distinct response patterns depending on whether reward is delivered in 100% (task 1) or 90% of trials (task 2) in a classical conditioning task. Here we found that inactivation of the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) affected dopaminergic signaling in task 2, in which the hidden state must be inferred ("will reward come or not?"), but not in task 1, where the state was known with certainty. Computational modeling suggests that the effects of inactivation are best explained by a circuit in which the mPFC conveys inference over hidden states to the dopamine system. VIDEO ABSTRACT.

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.1016/j.neuron.2018.03.036

Cites

57 of 57 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Claims the paper makes

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

  • The brain may have dedicated machinery, perhaps in prefrontal cortex, for computing belief states, which could then be provided to downstream areas, such as the basal ganglia, to perform standard RL algorithms such as TD learning.

    “The brain may have dedicated machinery, perhaps in prefrontal cortex [12,13], for computing belief states, which could then be provided to downstream areas, such as the basal ganglia, to perform standard RL algorithms such as TD learning [14].”

    From Emergence of belief-like representations through reinforcement learning (2023) · cites this paper as [13]

  • As a working example, we will consider the probabilistic associative learning paradigm where dopamine RPEs were shown to be consistent with a belief representation.

    “As a working example, we will consider the probabilistic associative learning paradigm where dopamine RPEs were shown to be consistent with a belief representation [7,13].”

    From Emergence of belief-like representations through reinforcement learning (2023) · cites this paper as [13]

  • In both tasks, mice were trained to associate an odor cue with probabilistic delivery of a liquid reward 1.2-2.8s later.

    “In both tasks, mice were trained to associate an odor cue with probabilistic delivery of a liquid reward 1.2-2.8slater.”

    From Emergence of belief-like representations through reinforcement learning (2023) · cites this paper as [13]

  • Previous work has shown that, in animals, prefrontal cortex activity is a necessary component of animals' state representations.

    “Previous work has shown that, in animals, prefrontal cortex activity is a necessary component of animals' state representations [13].”

    From Emergence of belief-like representations through reinforcement learning (2023) · cites this paper as [13]

  • Inactivating prefrontal cortex in the Starkweather task led to animals' RPEs in Task 2 resembling the RPEs of Task 1.

    “This work found that inactivating prefrontal cortex in the Starkweather task led to animals' RPEs in Task 2 resembling the RPEs of Task 1.”

    From Emergence of belief-like representations through reinforcement learning (2023) · cites this paper as [13]

Self-check

Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.

The self-check needs the paper’s full text.

Cites

Flagged first, then by citations

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Related

Authors
Starkweather, C. K., Gershman, S. J., & Uchida, N.
Affiliations
Harvard University (US)
Corresponding author
  • Gershman, Samuel J.
  • Uchida, Naoshige
ORCID
Venue
Neuron
Publisher
Elsevier BV
Published
2018-05
Volume
98
Issue
3
Pages
616-629.e6
ISSN
0896-6273 (ISSN-L)
DOI
10.1016/j.neuron.2018.03.036
PMC
PMC5934341
OpenAlex
W2797393690
Cited by
136
References
57
Citations by year
2026: 13 · 2025: 23 · 2024: 14 · 2023: 19 · 2022: 12 · 2021: 17 · 2020: 19 · 2019: 13 · 2018: 6
FWCI
6.26
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
Locations
  • Neuron (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (acceptedVersion)
  • PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
Funders
  • NIH (R01MH095953, R01MH101207)
  • CRCNS (R01-1207833, F30MH112242-01A1, T32MH020017, T32GM007753)
  • Harvard Brain Science Initiative
  • Simons Collaboration on Global Brain
  • Harvard Mind Brain and Behavior
Topics
  • Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cellular and Molecular Neuroscience › Neurotransmitter Receptor Influence on Behavior
  • Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Neural and Behavioral Psychology Studies
  • Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Memory and Neural Mechanisms
Keywords
medial prefrontal cortex, dopamine, reward prediction error, state uncertainty, hidden state inference, midbrain dopaminergic neurons, neural inactivation, classical conditioning, computational modeling
MeSH terms
Action Potentials, Animals, Dopamine, Forecasting, Male, Mice, Inbred C57BL, Mice, Transgenic, Nerve Net, Odorants, Reward, Prefrontal Cortex, Uncertainty, Mice

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review