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Contribution Details

Type Journal Article
Scope Discipline-based scholarship
Title Rewarding feedback after correct visual discriminations has both general and specific influences on visual cortex
Organization Unit
Authors
  • R S Weil
  • N Furl
  • Christian Ruff
  • M Symmonds
  • G Flandin
  • R J Dolan
  • J Driver
  • G Reese
Item Subtype Original Work
Refereed Yes
Status Published in final form
Language
  • English
Journal Title Journal of Neurophysiology
Publisher American Physiological Society
Geographical Reach international
ISSN 0022-3077
Volume 104
Number 3
Page Range 1746 - 1757
Date 2010
Abstract Text Reward can influence visual performance, but the neural basis of this effect remains poorly understood. Here we used functional magnetic resonance imaging to investigate how rewarding feedback affected activity in distinct areas of human visual cortex, separating rewarding feedback events after correct performance from preceding visual events. Participants discriminated oriented gratings in either hemifield, receiving auditory feedback at trial end that signaled financial reward after correct performance. Greater rewards improved performance for all but the most difficult trials. Rewarding feedback increased blood-oxygen-level-dependent (BOLD) signals in striatum and orbitofrontal cortex. It also increased BOLD signals in visual areas beyond retinotopic cortex, but not in primary visual cortex representing the judged stimuli. These modulations were seen at a time point in which no visual stimuli were presented or expected, demonstrating a novel type of activity change in visual cortex that cannot reflect modulation of response to incoming or anticipated visual stimuli. Rewarded trials led on the next trial to improved performance and enhanced visual activity contralateral to the judged stimulus, for retinotopic representations of the judged visual stimuli in V1. Our findings distinguish general effects in nonretinotopic visual cortex when receiving rewarding feedback after correct performance from consequences of reward for spatially specific responses in V1.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1152/jn.00870.2009
PubMed ID 20660419
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