Course outline
Module 1
Module 1: Foundations of Decision Neuroscience
Foundations of Decision Neuroscience
Knowledge check
Q1. Which brain region is most strongly associated with evaluating potential rewards and value during decision making?
- A. Primary visual cortex
- B. Ventromedial prefrontal cortex ✓
- C. Broca's area
- D. Cerebellum
Why: The ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) integrates information about the value of different options and is consistently implicated in encoding subjective value to guide choices.
Q2. What does the term 'expected value' refer to in decision neuroscience?
- A. The emotional intensity of a decision
- B. The average outcome of an option weighted by the probability of each outcome ✓
- C. The speed at which a choice is made
- D. The number of options available to a decision maker
Why: Expected value is calculated by multiplying each possible outcome by its probability and summing the results, providing a normative benchmark for comparing choices under uncertainty.
Q3. Which neurotransmitter is widely linked to reward prediction error signaling in decision making?
- A. Acetylcholine
- B. Dopamine ✓
- C. Serotonin
- D. GABA
Why: Dopaminergic neurons in the midbrain fire in response to unexpected rewards and shift their activity to predictive cues, a pattern described as a reward prediction error signal that drives learning.
Q4. What is the main difference between a 'risky' choice and an 'ambiguous' choice?
- A. Risky choices involve known probabilities, while ambiguous choices involve unknown or unspecified probabilities ✓
- B. Risky choices always involve money, while ambiguous choices involve food
- C. Risky choices are made faster than ambiguous choices
- D. Risky choices have no possible negative outcomes
Why: In risky decisions the probabilities of outcomes are explicitly known, whereas in ambiguous decisions the probabilities themselves are unknown, a distinction that engages different neural and behavioral responses.
Q5. Which of the following best describes the dual-process view of decision making?
- A. Decisions are made only by the left hemisphere of the brain
- B. Decisions arise from both fast, intuitive processes and slower, deliberative processes ✓
- C. Decisions are determined entirely by genetic factors
- D. Decisions require two separate people to agree
Why: Dual-process theories propose that decisions draw on an automatic, fast system and a controlled, slow system, and neuroscience studies try to map these processes onto distinct neural circuits.
Module 2
Module 2: Reward and Value Signals in the Brain
Reward and Value Signals in the Brain
Knowledge check
Q1. Which neurotransmitter is most closely associated with reward prediction error signals in the brain?
- A. Serotonin
- B. Dopamine ✓
- C. Acetylcholine
- D. GABA
Why: Midbrain dopamine neurons fire in proportion to the difference between expected and received reward, a signal known as reward prediction error that drives learning about which actions and cues are valuable.
Q2. Which brain region is a major source of dopamine neurons involved in reward processing?
- A. Amygdala
- B. Hippocampus
- C. Ventral tegmental area ✓
- D. Occipital cortex
Why: The ventral tegmental area (VTA) in the midbrain contains dopamine-producing neurons that project to regions such as the nucleus accumbens and prefrontal cortex, forming a core part of the brain's reward circuitry.
Q3. What happens to dopamine neuron firing when an expected reward is delivered exactly as predicted?
- A. It increases strongly
- B. It decreases below baseline
- C. It shows little or no change from baseline ✓
- D. It fires in bursts continuously
Why: When a reward matches its prediction, there is no prediction error, so dopamine neurons show little change from their baseline firing rate. Unexpected rewards produce bursts, and omitted expected rewards produce dips.
Q4. What is meant by the term 'subjective value' in decision neuroscience?
- A. The objective market price of a good
- B. The internal worth an individual assigns to an option, which guides choice ✓
- C. The amount of sensory input a stimulus produces
- D. The speed at which a decision is made
Why: Subjective value refers to the personal, internally computed worth of an option to a particular individual, which may differ from its objective price and is what the brain uses to compare options and guide choices.
Q5. Which brain region is commonly linked to encoding the subjective value of options during decision making?
- A. Primary visual cortex
- B. Ventromedial prefrontal cortex ✓
- C. Primary motor cortex
- D. Auditory cortex
Why: The ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) has been repeatedly shown in neuroimaging and lesion studies to represent the subjective value of options, integrating reward information to support choice.
Module 3
Module 3: Risk, Uncertainty, and Probability
Risk, Uncertainty, and Probability
Knowledge check
Q1. Which term describes a situation where the probabilities of possible outcomes are known?
- A. Ambiguity
- B. Risk ✓
- C. Uncertainty
- D. Ignorance
Why: Risk refers to decision-making situations in which the possible outcomes and their probabilities are known. Uncertainty and ambiguity involve probabilities that are unknown or unclear.
Q2. A fair coin is flipped and lands heads five times in a row. What is the probability that the next flip is heads?
- A. Less than 50%, because tails is due
- B. Exactly 50%, because each flip is independent ✓
- C. Greater than 50%, because heads is on a streak
- D. Close to 0%, because the streak must end
Why: Each coin flip is independent, so past outcomes do not change the probability of future ones. The gambler's fallacy is the mistaken belief that a streak makes the opposite outcome more likely.
Q3. What does the expected value of a gamble represent?
- A. The most likely single outcome
- B. The best possible outcome
- C. The probability-weighted average of all possible outcomes ✓
- D. The outcome that occurs most often in practice
Why: Expected value multiplies each possible outcome by its probability and sums the results. It gives the long-run average payoff, which may differ from the most likely outcome.
Q4. Which brain region is most strongly associated with processing rewards and computing expected value during decisions?
- A. The amygdala only
- B. The occipital lobe
- C. The ventral striatum and ventromedial prefrontal cortex ✓
- D. The cerebellum
Why: Neuroimaging studies consistently link the ventral striatum and ventromedial prefrontal cortex to reward anticipation and the representation of subjective value in decision making.
Q5. Which statement best describes risk aversion?
- A. Preferring a gamble over a sure thing with the same expected value
- B. Preferring a sure thing over a gamble with the same or higher expected value ✓
- C. Always choosing the option with the highest possible payoff
- D. Ignoring probabilities when making decisions
Why: Risk-averse people prefer a certain outcome to a gamble of equal or greater expected value, reflecting the tendency to value avoiding losses and uncertainty.
Module 4
Module 4: Dual-Process Thinking: Intuition vs. Deliberation
Dual-Process Thinking: Intuition vs. Deliberation
Knowledge check
Q1. In dual-process theory, which description best characterizes System 1 thinking?
- A. Slow, effortful, and rule-based
- B. Fast, automatic, and intuitive ✓
- C. Logical, sequential, and conscious
- D. Deliberate, reflective, and language-dependent
Why: System 1 is the fast, automatic, and intuitive mode of thinking that operates with little effort or conscious control, in contrast to the slow, deliberate System 2.
Q2. Which of the following is an example of a task that relies primarily on System 2 processing?
- A. Recognizing a friend's face in a crowd
- B. Completing the phrase 'bread and...'
- C. Calculating 17 multiplied by 24 in your head ✓
- D. Detecting anger in someone's tone of voice
Why: Multi-step mental arithmetic requires effortful, sequential, working-memory-intensive processing, which is characteristic of System 2. The other options are quick, automatic perceptual or associative tasks.
Q3. What is a common consequence of relying too heavily on intuitive (System 1) judgments?
- A. Increased susceptibility to cognitive biases and heuristic errors ✓
- B. Complete elimination of emotional influence on decisions
- C. Guaranteed accuracy in complex statistical problems
- D. Slower reaction times in familiar situations
Why: Intuitive shortcuts (heuristics) are efficient but can produce systematic errors such as anchoring, availability bias, and overconfidence when they are applied to problems that require careful analysis.
Q4. Which brain region is most closely associated with the deliberate, controlled reasoning typical of System 2?
- A. The amygdala
- B. The brainstem
- C. The dorsolateral prefrontal cortex ✓
- D. The cerebellum
Why: The dorsolateral prefrontal cortex supports working memory, planning, and inhibitory control, all of which underpin effortful deliberative reasoning. The amygdala is more involved in rapid emotional responses.
Q5. A bat and a ball cost $1.10 in total. The bat costs $1.00 more than the ball. Why do many people quickly answer that the ball costs $0.10?
- A. They have perfect arithmetic recall
- B. System 1 produces an intuitive but incorrect answer that System 2 fails to check ✓
- C. The problem is designed to be unsolvable
- D. They deliberately reason backward from the answer choices
Why: The intuitive response of $0.10 comes from System 1's quick substitution of an easy-seeming answer. The correct answer is $0.05, but many people do not engage System 2 to verify the calculation, so the wrong intuition goes unchecked.
Module 5
Module 5: Emotion and Decision Making
Emotion and Decision Making
Knowledge check
Q1. Which brain structure is most strongly associated with processing emotional responses that influence decision making?
- A. Cerebellum
- B. Amygdala ✓
- C. Medulla oblongata
- D. Occipital lobe
Why: The amygdala plays a central role in detecting emotionally significant stimuli and generating emotional responses such as fear, which can strongly shape decisions, often rapidly and before conscious deliberation.
Q2. Antonio Damasio's somatic marker hypothesis proposes that decision making is guided by which of the following?
- A. Purely logical calculation of expected utility
- B. Bodily emotional signals linked to past outcomes ✓
- C. Random selection when information is incomplete
- D. Social conformity alone
Why: Damasio proposed that emotional bodily states, or somatic markers, become associated with past outcomes and help guide future choices by flagging options as good or bad before extensive reasoning occurs.
Q3. Patients with damage to the ventromedial prefrontal cortex often show which pattern in decision making?
- A. Excessive caution and avoidance of all risks
- B. Intact reasoning but poor real-life decisions despite normal IQ ✓
- C. Improved emotional regulation
- D. Complete loss of memory
Why: Damage to the ventromedial prefrontal cortex can impair the integration of emotion into decisions, leading to poor choices in daily life even when abstract reasoning and intelligence test performance remain intact.
Q4. What is the term for the tendency to make decisions based on how an option feels in the moment rather than on careful analysis?
- A. Confirmation bias
- B. Affect heuristic ✓
- C. Sunk cost fallacy
- D. Anchoring effect
Why: The affect heuristic describes relying on current emotional reactions to judge options quickly, such as deciding a risk is acceptable because it feels positive, rather than weighing probabilities and consequences explicitly.
Q5. How does acute stress typically affect decision making?
- A. It always leads to more rational and balanced choices
- B. It can shift decisions toward faster, more habitual responses and reduce deliberate analysis ✓
- C. It has no measurable effect on choices
- D. It only affects decisions about money
Why: Acute stress increases reliance on fast, habitual, and threat-focused processing, often reducing the capacity for flexible deliberation and sometimes leading to more impulsive or narrowly focused choices.
Module 6
Module 6: Social Influences on Choice
Social Influences on Choice
Knowledge check
Q1. Which brain region is most closely associated with processing social rewards, such as approval from peers?
- A. The primary visual cortex
- B. The ventral striatum ✓
- C. The cerebellum
- D. The medulla oblongata
Why: The ventral striatum, part of the brain's reward circuitry, responds to social rewards like approval and acceptance, much as it responds to monetary or food rewards, which helps explain why social approval strongly shapes choices.
Q2. What is conformity in the context of social influence on decision making?
- A. Making choices that deliberately contradict the majority to appear independent
- B. Adjusting one's judgments or behavior to match the views of a group ✓
- C. Calculating the statistically optimal choice based on available data
- D. Avoiding decisions altogether when information is incomplete
Why: Conformity refers to changing one's beliefs or behavior to align with a group's norms or majority opinion, a well-documented social influence on choice, as shown in Asch's line-judgment experiments.
Q3. In Asch's classic conformity experiments, what did participants typically do when confederates unanimously gave an incorrect answer?
- A. They always gave the correct answer regardless of the group
- B. They refused to answer any questions
- C. A substantial proportion conformed to the incorrect majority at least some of the time ✓
- D. They switched to answering randomly without considering the lines
Why: Asch found that a meaningful share of participants conformed to the clearly wrong unanimous majority on a notable portion of trials, demonstrating the power of group pressure even when the correct answer was obvious.
Q4. What is the 'social proof' heuristic?
- A. The tendency to rely on the actions and choices of others as evidence of what is correct or desirable ✓
- B. The requirement that scientific claims be verified by multiple independent labs
- C. A strategy of comparing oneself only to people who are worse off
- D. The belief that social hierarchies are fixed and unchangeable
Why: Social proof is a heuristic in which people infer the correct behavior from what others are doing, especially when they are uncertain, which is why popularity cues like crowded restaurants or high review counts influence choices.
Q5. How does the presence of others typically affect the brain's valuation of risky decisions, according to research on social decision making?
- A. It makes people completely ignore potential rewards
- B. It can shift risk-taking, often increasing it in some contexts such as adolescents with peers, by altering reward and threat processing ✓
- C. It eliminates all activity in the prefrontal cortex
- D. It has no measurable effect on neural activity during choices
Why: Studies, including work on adolescent risk-taking, show that peer presence can amplify reward sensitivity and alter risk evaluation, changing both behavior and the neural activity involved in weighing gains and losses.
Module 7
Module 7: Biases, Errors, and Improving Decisions
Biases, Errors, and Improving Decisions
Knowledge check
Q1. Which bias describes the tendency to rely heavily on the first piece of information encountered when making a decision?
- A. Confirmation bias
- B. Anchoring bias ✓
- C. Hindsight bias
- D. Availability heuristic
Why: Anchoring bias occurs when an initial value or piece of information (the 'anchor') disproportionately influences subsequent judgments, even when that anchor is arbitrary or irrelevant.
Q2. A person who only seeks out news articles that support their existing political views is most likely displaying which bias?
- A. Dunning-Kruger effect
- B. Sunk cost fallacy
- C. Confirmation bias ✓
- D. Framing effect
Why: Confirmation bias is the tendency to search for, interpret, and remember information in a way that confirms one's pre-existing beliefs while giving less weight to contradictory evidence.
Q3. Judging the likelihood of an event based on how easily examples come to mind is an example of which mental shortcut?
- A. Representativeness heuristic
- B. Availability heuristic ✓
- C. Loss aversion
- D. Status quo bias
Why: The availability heuristic leads people to overestimate the probability of events that are easily recalled, often because they are vivid, recent, or widely reported, such as overestimating plane crash risk after a news story.
Q4. Continuing to invest in a failing project because of the money and time already spent on it reflects which error?
- A. Sunk cost fallacy ✓
- B. Hindsight bias
- C. Bandwagon effect
- D. Optimism bias
Why: The sunk cost fallacy is the tendency to keep committing resources to a decision because of past investments, even when future costs outweigh future benefits. Rational decisions should consider only future costs and benefits.
Q5. Which strategy is most effective for reducing the influence of cognitive biases on important decisions?
- A. Making decisions quickly to avoid overthinking
- B. Relying exclusively on intuition from past experience
- C. Considering alternative viewpoints and actively seeking disconfirming evidence ✓
- D. Deferring to the opinion of the most senior person in the group
Why: Actively considering alternatives and seeking evidence that could disprove your initial view counteracts confirmation bias and other judgment errors, leading to more balanced and accurate decisions.