The Anterior Insula Processes a Time-Resolved Subjective Risk Prediction Error
Open accessAbstract
The insula processes errors in the prediction of risky, motivationally relevant outcomes and thereby is thought to respond similarly to better-than-predicted and worse-than-predicted outcomes. However, the nature of the encoded risk prediction error signals remained unclear. Moreover, the insula was proposed to preferentially process events and stimuli in the aversive domain, rather than in a domain-general fashion. Here, we aimed to illuminate these issues. In a Pavlovian task, participants ( n = 41; 19 women) rated both cues and outcomes, allowing us to quantify not only objective but also trial-specific subjective risk prediction errors. We found preferential coding of subjective risk prediction errors in the anterior insula and adjacent frontal cortex. This contrasted with preferential coding of objective risk prediction errors in the mid-insula. The anterior insula encoded the subjective risk prediction errors not only at the time of outcomes but also at the time of cues, in line with a temporally fine-grained computation of these prediction errors. Cue-induced subjective risk prediction error signals occurred predominantly in the aversive domain, while outcome-induced subjective risk prediction error signals occurred also in the appetitive domain. Domain-specific analyses of risk prediction errors elicited by the preceding outcome at the time of the next cue indicated that the anterior insula updates risk predictions more strongly in the aversive than the appetitive domain. Together, our findings specify the nature of risk prediction errors processed by the anterior insula as subjective, time-resolved, partly domain-general (outcome), and partly domain-preferential (cue), thereby reconciling apparently disparate lines of research.
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- Authors
- Kim, J.-C., Hellrung, L., Nebe, S., & Tobler, P. N.
- Affiliations
- University of Zurich (CH)
- Corresponding author
- Kim, Jae-Chang
- Tobler, Philippe N.
- Venue
- The Journal of Neuroscience
- Publisher
- Society for Neuroscience
- Published
- 2025-04-23
- Volume
- 45
- Issue
- 23
- Pages
- e2302242025
- ISSN
- 0270-6474 (ISSN-L)
- 1529-2401
- PMC
- PMC12139582
- OpenAlex
- W4409725105
- Cited by
- 12
- References
- 66
- Citations by year
- 2026: 8 · 2025: 4
- FWCI
- 6.80
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- hybrid
- doi.org
- Locations
- Journal of Neuroscience (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Zurich Open Repository and Archive (University of Zurich) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
- Funders
- Swiss National Science Foundation (10001C_188878, 100019_176016, P1ZHP1_184166)
- European Union's Horizon 2020 (794395)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Neural and Behavioral Psychology Studies
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Memory and Neural Mechanisms
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cellular and Molecular Neuroscience › Neurotransmitter Receptor Influence on Behavior
- Keywords
- anterior insula, classical conditioning, domain specificity, frontal cortex
- MeSH terms
- Insular Cortex, Adolescent, Adult, Brain Mapping, Conditioning, Classical, Cues, Female, Humans, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Male, Risk-Taking, Time Factors, Young Adult
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