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Neural basis of deciding, choosing and acting

Nature Reviews Neuroscience volume 2, pages 33–42 (2001)Cite this article

Abstract

The ability and opportunity to make decisions and carry out effective actions in pursuit of goals is central to intelligent life. Recent research has provided significant new insights into how the brain arrives at decisions, makes choices, and produces and evaluates the consequences of actions. In fact, by monitoring or manipulating specific neurons, certain choices can now be predicted or manipulated.

Key Points

  • Neurophysiological studies over the past decade have provided new insights into how the brain arrives at decisions, makes choices, produces actions and evaluates the consequences of actions.

  • Choice, decision and action are common words that require precise definitions to prevent confusion. Decision refers to covert deliberation about ambiguous or conflicting alternatives. Choice refers to the final commitment, an overt action performed in the context of alternatives for which explanations in terms of reasons and desires can be given.

  • Neural correlates of choosing, deciding and acting have been identified by monitoring neural activity in macaque monkeys performing tasks that require one response among alternatives that are more or less distinct with possibly different pay-offs. Hypotheses arising from neurophysiological data have been tested and extended by electrically stimulating the brain to probe and manipulate decision processes.

  • Neuroscience research shows that the choice of an agent hinges on activating a surprisingly small number of neurons in discrete parts of the brain. The fact that decisions can be predicted and manipulated challenges some accounts of the freedom of the will. However, the unpredictability inherent in nonlinear dynamic brain processes transpiring in an unpredictable world affords validity to our decisions.

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Figure 1: Visual choice behaviour.
Figure 2: Neural correlates of a choice in visual search.
Figure 3: Neural correlates of a perceptual decision.
Figure 4: Neural control of a purposeful eye movement.
Figure 5: Neural correlates of performance monitoring.

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Acknowledgements

I am very grateful to R. Blake, M. Chun, F. Ebner, R. Marois, A. Murthy, M. Shadlen and V. Stuphorn for comments on the manuscript. Research in my laboratory is supported by the NEI, the NIMH and the McKnight Endowment Fund for Neuroscience.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology Vanderbilt University, Vanderbilt Vision Research Centre, Nashville, 37240, Tennessee, USA

    Jeffrey D. Schall

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FURTHER INFORMATION

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Glossary

FRONTAL EYE FIELD

An area in the frontal lobe that receives visual inputs and produces movements of the eye.

ODDBALL

The one stimulus that is different from all of the rest. Usually refers to the stimulus that has a unique feature (colour, form, direction of motion) in a visual search array.

BACKWARD MASKING

The reduced perception that occurs when a weak stimulus is followed immediately by a stronger stimulus.

BINOCULAR RIVALRY

The perceptual alternation that occurs when markedly different stimuli are presented to the two eyes – for example, horizontal bars in one eye and vertical bars in the other.

RESPONSE TIME

The time that elapses between presentation of a stimulus requiring a behavioural response and the time of initiation of the response.

RACE MODEL

A common model in cognitive psychology in which a behaviour is supposed to be the outcome of a race between two or more processes that have random finish times. Race models have been used to explain choice behaviour and the control of actions.

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Schall, J. Neural basis of deciding, choosing and acting. Nat Rev Neurosci 2, 33–42 (2001). https://doi.org/10.1038/35049054

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