Chaudhry Amir M, Parkinson John A, Hinton Elanor C, Owen Adrian M, Roberts Angela C
Department of Physiology, Development and Neuroscience, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB23DY, UK.
Eur J Neurosci. 2009 Mar;29(5):1047-55. doi: 10.1111/j.1460-9568.2009.06646.x.
Environmental stimuli constantly compete for human attention and in many cases decisions are made based on the affective meaning they convey. Although the network of structures involved in processing affective value has been well described, the specific contribution of these structures to the process by which affective value guides decision making is less well understood and is the focus of the present study. Thus, subjects read descriptions of individually tailored holidays, varying in incentive value and then made preference judgements, cognitive judgements or no decision. Choices made from an affective perspective, compared with those made from a cognitive perspective, activated a region of the anterior insula/operculum and also the anterior cingulate cortex. Furthermore, activity in perigenual, anterior cingulate cortex was correlated with subjective ratings of incentive value. In contrast, medial orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) and a region of posterior ventrolateral prefrontal cortex (PFC), bordering on the insula, were found to be more active when affective stimuli guided response selection than when no selection was made. However, only the activity in the ventrolateral PFC was specific to response selection based on affective compared with cognitive judgements. It is proposed that the necessary introspection required to make subjective preference judgements is provided by the insula and cingulate cortices, while the medial OFC and posterior ventrolateral PFC/insula cortices contribute to stimulus evaluation and motivational aspects of response selection, respectively.
环境刺激不断争夺人类的注意力，在许多情况下，决策是基于它们所传达的情感意义做出的。尽管参与处理情感价值的结构网络已得到充分描述，但这些结构对情感价值指导决策过程的具体贡献却鲜为人知，这也是本研究的重点。因此，受试者阅读了针对个人定制的假期描述，这些描述的激励价值各不相同，然后做出偏好判断、认知判断或不做决定。与从认知角度做出的选择相比，从情感角度做出的选择激活了前脑岛/岛盖的一个区域以及前扣带回皮层。此外，膝周前扣带回皮层的活动与激励价值的主观评分相关。相比之下，当情感刺激引导反应选择时，内侧眶额皮层（OFC）和与脑岛相邻的后外侧前额叶皮层（PFC）的一个区域比不做选择时更活跃。然而，只有外侧前额叶皮层的活动在基于情感判断与认知判断的反应选择上具有特异性。有人提出，脑岛和扣带回皮层提供了做出主观偏好判断所需的必要内省，而内侧眶额皮层和后外侧前额叶皮层/脑岛皮层分别有助于刺激评估和反应选择的动机方面。
