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- Title
Decoding the neural dynamics of free choice in humans.
- Authors
Thiery, Thomas; Saive, Anne-Lise; Combrisson, Etienne; Dehgan, Arthur; Bastin, Julien; Kahane, Philippe; Berthoz, Alain; Lachaux, Jean-Philippe; Jerbi, Karim
- Abstract
How do we choose a particular action among equally valid alternatives? Nonhuman primate findings have shown that decision-making implicates modulations in unit firing rates and local field potentials (LFPs) across frontal and parietal cortices. Yet the electrophysiological brain mechanisms that underlie free choice in humans remain ill defined. Here, we address this question using rare intracerebral electroencephalography (EEG) recordings in surgical epilepsy patients performing a delayed oculomotor decision task. We find that the temporal dynamics of high-gamma (HG, 60–140 Hz) neural activity in distinct frontal and parietal brain areas robustly discriminate free choice from instructed saccade planning at the level of single trials. Classification analysis was applied to the LFP signals to isolate decision-related activity from sensory and motor planning processes. Compared with instructed saccades, free-choice trials exhibited delayed and longer-lasting HG activity during the delay period. The temporal dynamics of the decision-specific sustained HG activity indexed the unfolding of a deliberation process, rather than memory maintenance. Taken together, these findings provide the first direct electrophysiological evidence in humans for the role of sustained high-frequency neural activation in frontoparietal cortex in mediating the intrinsically driven process of freely choosing among competing behavioral alternatives. How do we choose a particular action among equally valid alternatives? Intracranial recordings in humans performing a delayed oculomotor decision task reveal that deliberating between competing alternatives during free choice is indexed by sustained high frequency neural activity in a network of parieto-frontal brain areas.
- Subjects
PERCEPTUAL-motor processes; ELECTROPHYSIOLOGY; MACAQUES; ELECTROENCEPHALOGRAPHY; HUMAN beings; PEOPLE with epilepsy
- Publication
PLoS Biology, 2020, Vol 18, Issue 12, p1
- ISSN
1544-9173
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1371/journal.pbio.3000864