Abstract
We make decisions based on envisioning the scenarios that might arise from alternative choices. A robust capacity to represent future scenarios leads an individual to long-sighted choices and positive outcomes (health, career) while inadequate consideration of the future leads to impulsive choices and negative outcomes (substance abuse, truncated education). How do we envision the future and fold it into our current choices? Recent work suggests that brain systems involved in remembering the past may supply the bricks with which to build representations of the future. However, the neural processes connecting memory with future thinking and future-oriented choice are unknown. Our project (shorthand: FORWARD) addresses this through a unique cross-species blend of experimental methodologies, with resolution ranging from whole brain to single-neuron. The overarching strategy is to conduct human neuropsychological studies to uncover how memories contribute to the representation of future scenarios; in parallel, FORWARD pursues animal studies to identify neuronal mechanisms for the interface between memory and future-thinking. The two research lines will be synergistic, with each posing hypotheses to be tested in the other. Future-oriented choice depends on constructing context-rich thinking about the future, mental images that can compete for saliency with easier, more immediate options. Under controlled laboratory conditions, future thinking reduces delay discounting (DD), the tendency to prefer immediate rewards to future rewards of larger value. One aim of FORWARD is to identify how distinct nodes of the core memory network are deployed to simulate future events and shape choice accordingly. Nodes of particular importance for memory and choice (medial temporal, ventromedial prefrontal, orbitofrontal cortex) will be explored through the study of human subjects with localized lesions. We predict specific deficits according to the affected node of the network. The single-neuron dynamics underlying future-oriented choice cannot be observed in human subjects. FORWARD explores cortical networks in rats – analogous to those in humans – by direct electrophysiological recording of the pre-play of future rewards during choice, and by non-invasive (optogenetic) inactivation to confirm human neuropsychology evidence of functional specificity at the level of discrete circuits. Building on the new insights into neural processing, FORWARD then tests, across species, the hypothesis that future-oriented choice can be enhanced through memory training/manipulations, and probes the specific memory components that are necessary and sufficient to bias choice towards the more distant future. If choice networks can be tuned by memory-based training, as we predict, then the project sets the stage for treating problems linked to steep DD and poor simulation of the future – from substance abuse and obesity, to lax adherence to COVID-19 mitigation rules.
Project details
Unibo Team Leader: Elisa Ciaramelli
Unibo involved Department/s:
Dipartimento di Psicologia "Renzo Canestrari"
Coordinator:
Scuola Internazionale Superiore di Studi Avanzati di TRIESTE(Italy)
Total Unibo Contribution: Euro (EUR) 96.280,00
Project Duration in months: 24
Start Date:
05/10/2023
End Date:
28/02/2026
