The research proposal focuses on studying the electrophysiological and oscillatory mechanisms underlying decision-making involving risk-reward tradeoffs. Specifically, we will record electrophysiological data from patients with extensive prefrontal cortex ECoG coverage (tens to hundreds of electrodes in lateral PFC, orbitofrontal cortex, and other PFC areas) while they carry out a gambling task. Using this data, we will test the hypotheses that oscillatory mechanisms reflect local valuation and global top-down control processes in decision-making. Decision-making is disturbed in numerous psychiatric disorders including schizophrenia, major depression, and a variety of personality disorders. As such, a deeper understanding of the cortical mechanisms supporting decision-making capacity has the promise to shed new light in a host of disorders relevant to the mission of the NIMH.
Our decisions are the result of combining external information about the world with internal information such as goals and preferences. Here we seek to understand the relationship of ongoing brain activity, in the form of electrical oscillations, to how we make decisions and reign in impulses to take risky, selfish or unhealthy, but desirable, options. This is fundamental part of human behavior breaks down in certain disorders such as addiction and here we hope to further the understanding of the neural basis of decision-making and self-control and pave the way for potential strategies to improve them.
