So, to ensure flexible behavior, humans and other animals do not just learn the general value of predictive events, but also encode the relationships between these cues and the identifying features of their associated outcomes 8, 9.
For example, if you see both pizza and donut boxes outside the seminar room, assuming you like both, you need to use these cues to represent the specific predicted foods in order to make the snack choice that is optimal in your current circumstances (e.g., are you craving something sweet or savory?). But often adaptive decision making requires accurate and detailed prospective consideration of potential outcomes. These learning signals are thought to cache the general value of a reward to its predictor and reinforce response policies that rely on past success, rather than forethought of specific outcomes 1– 7. The canonical view is that midbrain dopamine neurons broadcast errors in reward prediction. These data reveal a dopaminergic pathway for the learning that supports adaptive decision making and help understand how VTA DA neurons achieve their emerging multifaceted role in learning.ĭopamine has long been known to critically contribute to learning. Dopamine is released in the BLA during stimulus-outcome pairing and VTA DA→BLA activity is necessary and sufficient to link the identifying features of a reward to a predictive cue, but does not mediate general value or reinforcement. We used fiber photometry, cell-type and pathway-specific optogenetic manipulation, Pavlovian cue-reward conditioning, and a decision-making test in male and female rats, to reveal that ventral tegmental area dopamine (VTADA) projections to the basolateral amygdala (BLA) drive the encoding of stimulus-outcome memories. Detailed stimulus-outcome memories are a core feature of such cognitive maps, yet little is known of the neuronal systems that support their encoding. To make adaptive decisions, we build an internal model of associative relationships in the environment and use it to predict specific forthcoming outcomes.
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