Department of Psychobiology, Universitat de València, Spain.
Department of Psychobiology, Universitat de València, Spain.
Biol Psychol. 2023 May;180:108585. doi: 10.1016/j.biopsycho.2023.108585. Epub 2023 May 11.
Whereas the effects of the early stages of acute stress seem to improve learning and increase loss aversion in decision making, in later stages, the opposite has been found, an impairment in decision making probably due to higher reward-attraction, as the STARS approach suggests. This study aims to investigate the effects of the later stages of acute stress on decision making and its underlying processes using a computational model. We hypothesized that stress would affect underlying cognitive strategies during decision making. Ninety-five participants were randomly distributed into two groups, experimental (N = 46) and control (N = 49). A virtual version of The Trier Social Stress Test (TSST) was used as a laboratory stressor. After 20 min, decision making was assessed by using the Iowa Gambling Task (IGT). The Value-Plus-Preservation (VPP) RL computational model was used to extract decision-making components. As expected, the stressed participants showed deficits in IGT performance on reinforcement-learning and feedback sensitivity. However, there was no gains attraction. These results are discussed by considering that decision making in later stages of acute stress could be based on impairments in prefrontal cortex functioning.
虽然急性压力早期阶段的影响似乎可以提高学习能力并增加决策中的损失厌恶，但在后期阶段，情况恰恰相反，正如 STARS 方法所表明的那样，决策能力受损可能是由于更高的奖励吸引力所致。本研究旨在使用计算模型研究急性压力后期阶段对决策及其潜在过程的影响。我们假设压力会影响决策过程中的潜在认知策略。95 名参与者被随机分配到两组，实验组（N=46）和对照组（N=49）。虚拟版的特里尔社会压力测试（TSST）被用作实验室压力源。20 分钟后，通过使用爱荷华赌博任务（IGT）评估决策能力。价值加保留（VPP）RL 计算模型用于提取决策组件。正如预期的那样，压力组在强化学习和反馈敏感性方面的 IGT 表现存在缺陷。然而，并没有出现收益吸引力。考虑到急性压力后期阶段的决策可能基于前额叶皮层功能障碍，这些结果将进行讨论。
