Department of Psychology and Brain Research Center, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia V6T 1Z4, Canada.
J Neurosci. 2014 Mar 26;34(13):4618-26. doi: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.5058-13.2014.
Different subregions of nucleus accumbens (NAc) have been implicated in reward seeking, promoting flexible approach responses, suppressing nonrewarded actions, and facilitating shifts between different discrimination strategies. Interestingly, the NAc does not appear to mediate shifting between stimulus-reward associations (i.e., reversal learning) when reinforcement is predictable. How these nuclei may facilitate flexible response strategies when reward delivery is uncertain remains unclear. We investigated the effects of inactivation of the NAc shell and core on probabilistic reversal learning using an operant task wherein a "correct" response delivered reward on 80% of trials, and an "incorrect" response was reinforced on 20% of trials. Reinforcement contingencies were reversed repeatedly within a session. In well-trained rats, shell inactivation reduced the number of reversals completed and selectively reduced win-stay behavior. This impairment was apparent during the first discrimination, indicating a more general deficit in the use of probabilistic reward feedback to guide action selection. Shell inactivation also impaired reversal performance on a similar task where correct/incorrect choices always/never delivered reward. However, this impairment only emerged after both levers had been associated with reward. Inactivation of NAc core did not impair reversal performance but increased latencies to approach the response levers. These results suggest the NAc shell and core facilitate reward seeking in a distinct yet complementary manner when the relationship between specific actions and reward is uncertain or ambiguous and cognitive flexibility is required. The core promotes approach toward reward-associated stimuli, whereas the shell refines response selection to those specific actions more likely to yield reward.
不同的伏隔核(NAc)亚区被认为与寻求奖励有关,促进灵活的接近反应,抑制无奖励的动作,并促进不同辨别策略之间的转变。有趣的是,当强化是可预测的时候,NAc 似乎并不介导刺激-奖励关联的转变(即反转学习)。当奖励是不确定的时候,这些核团如何促进灵活的反应策略仍然不清楚。我们使用操作性任务研究了 NAc 壳和核的失活对概率反转学习的影响,在这个任务中,“正确”的反应在 80%的试验中给予奖励,而“错误”的反应在 20%的试验中得到强化。强化条件在一个试验 session 内反复改变。在训练有素的大鼠中,壳的失活减少了完成的反转次数,并选择性地减少了保持奖励的行为。这种损伤在第一次辨别中就很明显,表明在使用概率性奖励反馈来指导动作选择方面存在更普遍的缺陷。壳的失活也损害了类似任务上的反转表现,在这种任务中,正确/错误的选择总是/从不给予奖励。然而,这种损伤只有在两个杠杆都与奖励相关联后才会出现。NAc 核的失活不会损害反转表现,但会增加接近反应杠杆的潜伏期。这些结果表明,当特定动作和奖励之间的关系不确定或模糊,需要认知灵活性时,NAc 壳和核以独特而互补的方式促进奖励寻求。核促进对与奖励相关的刺激的接近,而壳则对那些更有可能产生奖励的特定动作进行更精细的反应选择。
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