Altered trial-to-trial responses to reward outcomes in KCNMA1 knockout mice during probabilistic learning tasks.

The large-conductance calcium- and voltage-activated potassium (BK) channels, encoded by the KCNMA1 gene, play important roles in neuronal function. Mutations in KCNMA1 have been found in patients with various neurodevelopmental features, including intellectual disability, autism spectrum disorder (ASD), or attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Previous studies of KCNMA1 knockout mice have suggested altered activity patterns and behavioral flexibility, but it remained unclear whether these changes primarily affect immediate behavioral adaptation or longer-term learning processes.

Causal intuition in the indefinite world: Meta-analysis and simulations.

Modeling our causal intuition can contribute to understanding our behavior. In this paper, we introduce a causal induction model called proportion of assumed-to-be rare instances (pARIs) and examine its adaptive properties. We employ the two-stage theory of causal induction proposed by Hattori and Oaksford in 2007, which divides causal induction into two stages: first, observed events are sifted and likely candidates are extracted; second, each of them is verified through intervention.