title: Medial prefrontal cortex-dorsal anterior cingulate cortex connectivity during behavior selection without an objective correct answer.
abstract: Life choices (e.g., occupational choice) often include situations with two or more possible correct answers, thereby putting us in a situation of conflict. Recent reports have described that the evaluation of conflict might be crucially mediated by neural activity in the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC), although the reduction of conflict might rather be associated with neural activity in the medial prefrontal cortex (MPFC). What remains unclear is whether these regions mutually interact, thereby raising the question of their functional connectivity during conflict situations. Using psychophysiological interaction (PPI) analyses of functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) data, this study shows that the dACC co-varied significantly higher with the MPFC during an occupational choice task with two possible correct answers when compared to the control task: a word-length task with one possible correct answer. These results suggest that the MPFC has a functional relation with dACC, especially in conflict situations where there is no objective correct answer. Taken together, this lends support to the assumption that the MPFC might be crucial in biasing the decision, thereby reducing conflict.
authors.affiliation: Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS), Japan. takana818@gmail.com
authors.forename: Takashi
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Nakao
authors.forename: Takahiro
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Osumi
authors.forename: Hideki
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Ohira
authors.forename: Yukinori
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Kasuya
authors.forename: Jun
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Shinoda
authors.forename: Jitsuhiro
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Yamada
authors.forename: Georg
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Northoff
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001931:Brain Mapping; D002755:Choice Behavior / Q000502:physiology*; D003220:Conflict, Psychological; D005260:Female; D006179:Gyrus Cinguli / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008297:Male; D009434:Neural Pathways / Q000502:physiology*; D017397:Prefrontal Cortex / Q000502:physiology*; D055815:Young Adult