Research article summary (published 28 Sep 2009):

Evidence for a common representation of decision values for dissimilar goods in human ventromedial prefrontal cortex.

Full Abstract

To make economic choices between goods, the brain needs to compute representations of their values. A great deal of research has been performed to determine the neural correlates of value representations in the human brain. However, it is still unknown whether there exists a region of the brain that commonly encodes decision values for different types of goods, or if, in contrast, the values of different types of goods are represented in distinct brain regions. We addressed this question by scanning subjects with functional magnetic resonance imaging while they made real purchasing decisions among different categories of goods (food, nonfood consumables, and monetary gambles). We found activity in a key brain region previously implicated in encoding goal-values: the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) was correlated with the subjects' value for each category of good. Moreover, we found a single area in vmPFC to be correlated with the subjects' valuations for all categories of goods. Our results provide evidence that the brain encodes a "common currency" that allows for a shared valuation for different categories of goods.

Author information

Author/s: Chib, Vikram S (VS); Rangel, Antonio (A); Shimojo, Shinsuke (S); O'Doherty, John P (JP);

Affiliation: Division of Humanities and Social Sciences, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, California 91125, USA. vchib(-atsign-)caltech.edu

Journal and publication information

Publication Type: Comparative Study; Journal Article; Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't; Research Support, U.S. Gov't, Non-P.H.S.

Journal: The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience (J Neurosci), published in United States. (Language: eng)

Reference: 2009-Sep; vol 29 (issue 39) : pp 12315-20

Dates: Created 2009/10/01; Completed 2009/10/13;

PMID: 19793990, status: MEDLINE (last retrieval date: 10/13/2009, IMS Date: )

Sourced from the National Library of Medicine. Abstract text and other information may be subject to copyright.

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MeSH headings (categories)

This article was linked to the MESH Headings shown below.

Adult Brain Mapping - methods Decision Making - physiology Female Humans

Humans Male Prefrontal Cortex - physiology Reinforcement (Psychology) Young Adult

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