Age Affects Reinforcement Learning through Dopamine-based Learning Imbalance and High Decision Noise — not through Parkinsonian Mechanisms

Probabilistic reinforcement learning declines in healthy cognitive aging. While some findings suggest impairments are especially conspicuous in learning from rewards, resembling deficits in Parkinson ’s disease, others also show impairments in learning from punishments. To reconcile these findings, we tested 252 adults from three age groups on a probabilistic reinforcement learning task, analyzed trial-by-trial performance with a Q-reinforcement learning model, and correlated both fitted model parameters and behavior to polymorphisms in dopamine-related genes.

Source: Neurobiology of Aging - April 18, 2018 Category: Neuroscience Authors: Ravi B. Sojitra, Itamar Lerner, Jessica. R. Petok, Mark A. Gluck Source Type: research