How Self-Determined Choice Facilitates Performance: A Key Role of the Ventromedial Prefrontal Cortex

TY - JOUR

T1 - How Self-Determined Choice Facilitates Performance

T2 - A Key Role of the Ventromedial Prefrontal Cortex

AU - Murayama, Kou

AU - Matsumoto, Madoka

AU - Izuma, Keise

AU - Sugiura, Ayaka

AU - Ryan, Richard M

AU - Deci, Edward L

AU - Matsumoto, Kenji

N1 - © The Author 2013.This is an author-produced version of the published paper. Uploaded in accordance with the publisher’s self-archiving policy. Further copying may not be permitted; contact the publisher for details

PY - 2015

Y1 - 2015

N2 - Recent studies have documented that self-determined choice does indeed enhance performance. However, the precise neural mechanisms underlying this effect are not well understood. We examined the neural correlates of the facilitative effects of self-determined choice using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Participants played a game-like task involving a stopwatch with either a stopwatch they selected (self-determined-choice condition) or one they were assigned without choice (forced-choice condition). Our results showed that self-determined choice enhanced performance on the stopwatch task, despite the fact that the choices were clearly irrelevant to task difficulty. Neuroimaging results showed that failure feedback, compared with success feedback, elicited a drop in the vmPFC activation in the forced-choice condition, but not in the self-determined-choice condition, indicating that negative reward value associated with the failure feedback vanished in the self-determined-choice condition. Moreover, the vmPFC resilience to failure in the self-determined-choice condition was significantly correlated with the increased performance. Striatal responses to failure and success feedback were not modulated by the choice condition, indicating the dissociation between the vmPFC and striatal activation pattern. These findings suggest that the vmPFC plays a unique and critical role in the facilitative effects of self-determined choice on performance.

AB - Recent studies have documented that self-determined choice does indeed enhance performance. However, the precise neural mechanisms underlying this effect are not well understood. We examined the neural correlates of the facilitative effects of self-determined choice using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Participants played a game-like task involving a stopwatch with either a stopwatch they selected (self-determined-choice condition) or one they were assigned without choice (forced-choice condition). Our results showed that self-determined choice enhanced performance on the stopwatch task, despite the fact that the choices were clearly irrelevant to task difficulty. Neuroimaging results showed that failure feedback, compared with success feedback, elicited a drop in the vmPFC activation in the forced-choice condition, but not in the self-determined-choice condition, indicating that negative reward value associated with the failure feedback vanished in the self-determined-choice condition. Moreover, the vmPFC resilience to failure in the self-determined-choice condition was significantly correlated with the increased performance. Striatal responses to failure and success feedback were not modulated by the choice condition, indicating the dissociation between the vmPFC and striatal activation pattern. These findings suggest that the vmPFC plays a unique and critical role in the facilitative effects of self-determined choice on performance.

U2 - 10.1093/cercor/bht317

DO - 10.1093/cercor/bht317

M3 - Article

C2 - 24297329

VL - 25

SP - 1241

EP - 1251

JO - Cerebral Cortex

JF - Cerebral Cortex

SN - 1047-3211

IS - 5

ER -