title: Motivated to win: Relationship between anticipatory and outcome reward-related neural activity.
abstract: Reward-processing involves two temporal stages characterized by two distinct neural processes: reward-anticipation and reward-outcome. Intriguingly, very little research has examined the relationship between neural processes involved in reward-anticipation and reward-outcome. To investigate this, one needs to consider the heterogeneity of reward-processing within each stage. To identify different stages of reward processing, we adapted a reward time-estimation task. While EEG data were recorded, participants were instructed to button-press 3.5s after the onset of an Anticipation-Cue and received monetary reward for good time-estimation on the Reward trials, but not on No-Reward trials. We first separated reward-anticipation into event related potentials (ERPs) occurring at three sub-stages: reward/no-reward cue-evaluation, motor-preparation and feedback-anticipation. During reward/no-reward cue-evaluation, the Reward-Anticipation Cue led to a smaller N2 and larger P3. During motor-preparation, we report, for the first time, that the Reward-Anticipation Cue enhanced the Readiness Potential (RP), starting approximately 1s before movement. At the subsequent feedback-anticipation stage, the Reward-Anticipation Cue elevated the Stimulus-Preceding Negativity (SPN). We also separated reward-outcome ERPs into different components occurring at different time-windows: the Feedback-Related Negativity (FRN), Feedback-P3 (FB-P3) and Late-Positive Potentials (LPP). Lastly, we examined the relationship between reward-anticipation and reward-outcome ERPs. We report that individual-differences in specific reward-anticipation ERPs uniquely predicted specific reward-outcome ERPs. In particular, the reward-anticipation Early-RP (1-.8s before movement) predicted early reward-outcome ERPs (FRN and FB-P3), whereas, the reward-anticipation SPN most strongly predicted a later reward-outcome ERP (LPP). Results have important implications for understanding the nature of the relationship between reward-anticipation and reward-outcome neural-processes.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Northwestern University, 2029 Sheridan Rd., Evanston, IL 60208, USA. Electronic address: nonnarun@u.northwestern.edu.
authors.forename: Narun
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Pornpattananangkul
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Northwestern University, 2029 Sheridan Rd., Evanston, IL 60208, USA. Electronic address: nusslock@northwestern.edu.
authors.forename: Robin
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Nusslock
mesh_terms: D001921:Brain / Q000502:physiology*; D003265:Contingent Negative Variation / Q000502:physiology; D004569:Electroencephalography; D005071:Evoked Potentials / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009042:Motivation / Q000502:physiology*; D012201:Reward; D013998:Time Perception / Q000502:physiology; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Feedback-Related Negativity; Late-Positive Potential; Readiness Potential; Reward anticipation; Reward outcome; Stimulus Preceding Negativity