Social risk coding by amygdala activity and connectivity with dorsal anterior cingulate cortex.

Risk is a fundamental factor affecting individual and social economic decisions, but its neural correlates are largely unexplored in the social domain. The amygdala, together with the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC), is thought to play a central role in risk taking. Here, we investigated in human volunteers (n=20; 11 females) how risk (defined as variance of reward probability distributions) in a social situation affects decisions and concomitant neural activity as measured with fMRI.

Dopamine neurons encode trial-by-trial subjective reward value in an auction-like task.

The dopamine reward prediction error signal is known to be subjective but has so far only been assessed in aggregate choices. However, personal choices fluctuate across trials and thus reflect the instantaneous subjective reward value. In the well-established Becker-DeGroot-Marschak (BDM) auction-like mechanism, participants are encouraged to place bids that accurately reveal their instantaneous subjective reward value; inaccurate bidding results in suboptimal reward ("incentive compatibility").

Interventions to Increase Affordable Care Act Marketplace Enrollment: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.

Over 10 million uninsured individuals are eligible for subsidized health insurance coverage through the Affordable Care Act (ACA) marketplaces, and millions more were projected to become eligible with the end of the federal COVID-19 Public Health Emergency in 2023. Individual studies on behaviorally informed interventions designed to encourage enrollment suggest that some are more effective than others. This study summarizes evidence on the efficacy of these interventions and suggests which administrative burdens might be most relevant for potential enrollees.

A Comparative Study of Commercially Available Ultrasound Contrast Agents for Sub-harmonic-Aided Pressure Estimation (SHAPE) in a Bladder Phantom.

Objective: The goal of this study was to evaluate the performance of different commercial ultrasound contrast microbubbles (MBs) when measuring bladder phantom pressure with sub-harmonic-aided pressure estimation (SHAPE) methodology. We hypothesized that SHAPE performance is dependent on MB formulation. This study aimed to advance the SHAPE application for bladder pressure measurements in humans.

A dopamine mechanism for reward maximization.

Individual survival and evolutionary selection require biological organisms to maximize reward. Economic choice theories define the necessary and sufficient conditions, and neuronal signals of decision variables provide mechanistic explanations. Reinforcement learning (RL) formalisms use predictions, actions, and policies to maximize reward.

A Good Place to Do Time? Detailing the Construction of Symbolic Social Boundaries in Correctional Boot Camps.

Drawing on qualitative interviews with 51 incarcerated adult men and nine correctional officers in a Western Canadian prison system, we ask why some incarcerated people find it appealing to be placed on correctional boot camp units and what such appeals tell us about broader conditions of incarceration. Participants on three boot camp units drew on narratives relating to (a) extrinsic benefits, (b) discipline and structure, (c) teamwork and positive relationships, and (d) an opportunity for self-improvement to construct symbolic boundaries between "normal" units and boot camps, as well as their former self and their transformed current self. By drawing symbolic boundaries between the past and present and between other units and their boot camp unit, our participants create narratives that allow them to partially mitigate some pains of imprisonment.

Peristalsis prevents ureteral dilation.

Purpose: The etiology of ureteral dilation in primary nonrefluxing, nonobstructing megaureters is still not well understood. Impaired ureteral peristalsis has been theorized as one of the contributing factors. However, ureteral peristalsis and its "normal" function is not well defined.

Using Computer Vision to Improve Endoscopic Disease Quantification in Therapeutic Clinical Trials of Ulcerative Colitis.

Background & Aims: Endoscopic assessment of ulcerative colitis (UC) typically reports only the maximum severity observed. Computer vision methods may better quantify mucosal injury detail, which varies among patients.

Methods: Endoscopic video from the UNIFI clinical trial (A Study to Evaluate the Safety and Efficacy of Ustekinumab Induction and Maintenance Therapy in Participants With Moderately to Severely Active Ulcerative Colitis) comparing ustekinumab and placebo for UC were processed in a computer vision analysis that spatially mapped Mayo Endoscopic Score (MES) to generate the Cumulative Disease Score (CDS).

Deep Learning Models Capture Histological Disease Activity in Crohn's Disease and Ulcerative Colitis with High Fidelity.

Background And Aims: Histological disease activity in inflammatory bowel disease [IBD] is associated with clinical outcomes and is an important endpoint in drug development. We developed deep learning models for automating histological assessments in IBD.

Methods: Histology images of intestinal mucosa from phase 2 and phase 3 clinical trials in Crohn's disease [CD] and ulcerative colitis [UC] were used to train artificial intelligence [AI] models to predict the Global Histology Activity Score [GHAS] for CD and Geboes histopathology score for UC.

A view-based decision mechanism for rewards in the primate amygdala.

Primates make decisions visually by shifting their view from one object to the next, comparing values between objects, and choosing the best reward, even before acting. Here, we show that when monkeys make value-guided choices, amygdala neurons encode their decisions in an abstract, purely internal representation defined by the monkey's current view but not by specific object or reward properties. Across amygdala subdivisions, recorded activity patterns evolved gradually from an object-specific value code to a transient, object-independent code in which currently viewed and last-viewed objects competed to reflect the emerging view-based choice.

Reliable population code for subjective economic value from heterogeneous neuronal signals in primate orbitofrontal cortex.

Behavior-related neuronal signals often vary between neurons, which might reflect the unreliability of individual neurons or a truly heterogeneous code. This notion may also apply to economic ("value-based") choices and the underlying reward signals. Reward value is subjective and can be described by a nonlinearly weighted magnitude (utility) and probability.

Worth the Work? Monkeys Discount Rewards by a Subjective Adapting Effort Cost.

All life must solve how to allocate limited energy resources to maximize benefits from scarce opportunities. Economic theory posits decision makers optimize choice by maximizing the subjective benefit (utility) of reward minus the subjective cost (disutility) of the required effort. While successful in many settings, this model does not fully account for how experience can alter reward-effort trade-offs.

The Floating Signifier of 'Safety': Correctional Officer Perspectives on COVID-19 Restrictions, Legitimacy and Prison Order.

The COVID-19 pandemic continues to affect prisons internationally. Existing research focuses on infection data, meaning we do not fully understand how COVID-19 shapes frontline prison dynamics. We draw on qualitative interviews with 21 Canadian federal correctional officers, exploring how the pandemic impacted prison management.

Studying neural responses for multi-component economic choices in human and non-human primates using concept-based behavioral choice experiments.

Realistic, everyday rewards contain multiple components, such as taste and size. However, our reward valuations and the associated neural reward signals are single dimensional (vector to scalar transformation). Here, we present a protocol to identify these single-dimensional neural responses for multi-component choice options in humans and monkeys using concept-based behavioral choice experiments.

Mechanisms of adjustments to different types of uncertainty in the reward environment across mice and monkeys.

Despite being unpredictable and uncertain, reward environments often exhibit certain regularities, and animals navigating these environments try to detect and utilize such regularities to adapt their behavior. However, successful learning requires that animals also adjust to uncertainty associated with those regularities. Here, we analyzed choice data from two comparable dynamic foraging tasks in mice and monkeys to investigate mechanisms underlying adjustments to different types of uncertainty.

Systematic comparison of risky choices in humans and monkeys.

The past decades have seen tremendous progress in fundamental studies on economic choice in humans. However, elucidation of the underlying neuronal processes requires invasive neurophysiological studies that are met with difficulties in humans. Monkeys as evolutionary closest relatives offer a solution.

Worth the work? Monkeys discount rewards by a subjective adapting effort cost.

Unlabelled: All life must solve how to allocate limited energy resources to maximise benefits from scarce opportunities. Economic theory posits decision makers optimise choice by maximising the subjective benefit (utility) of reward minus the subjective cost (disutility) of the required effort. While successful in many settings, this model does not fully account for how experience can alter reward-effort trade-offs.

Dopamine neurons encode trial-by-trial subjective reward value in an auction-like task.

The dopamine reward prediction error signal is known to be subjective but has so far only been assessed in aggregate choices. However, personal choices fluctuate across trials and thus reflect the instantaneous subjective reward value. In the well-established Becker-DeGroot-Marschak (BDM) auction-like mechanism, participants are encouraged to place bids that accurately reveal their instantaneous subjective reward value; inaccurate bidding results in suboptimal reward ('incentive compatibility').

Risky choice: Probability weighting explains independence axiom violations in monkeys.

Unlabelled: Expected Utility Theory (EUT) provides axioms for maximizing utility in risky choice. The Independence Axiom (IA) is its most demanding axiom: preferences between two options should not change when altering both options equally by mixing them with a common gamble. We tested common consequence (CC) and common ratio (CR) violations of the IA over several months in thousands of stochastic choices using a large variety of binary option sets.

"I have to be a man for my son": The narrative uses of fatherhood in prison.

Research on incarcerated fathers tends to accentuate the harmful familial consequences of parental incarceration and discuss how having children might prompt incarcerated fathers to desist from crime. Less attention has focused on how narratives of fatherhood shape the day-to-day dynamics of incarceration. Drawing on 93 qualitative interviews with incarcerated fathers in Western Canada, we focus specifically on our participants' parenting narratives.

Ultrasound Contrast Stability for Urinary Bladder Pressure Measurement.

The goal of this study was to evaluate ultrasound contrast microbubbles (MB) stability during a typical cystometrogram (CMG) for bladder pressure measurement application using the subharmonic-aided pressure estimation technique. A detailed study of MB stability was required given two unique characteristics of this application: first, bulk infusion of MBs into the bladder through the CMG infusion system, and second, duration of a typical CMG which may last up to 30 min. To do so, a series of size measurement and contrast-enhanced ultrasound imaging studies under different conditions were performed and the effects of variables that we hypothesized have an effect on MB stability, namely, i) IV bag air headspace, ii) MB dilution factor, and iii) CMG infusion system were investigated.

Pressure Measurement in a Bladder Phantom Using Contrast-Enhanced Ultrasonography-A Path to a Catheter-Free Voiding Cystometrogram.

Objectives: The long-term goal of this study is to investigate the efficacy of a novel, ultrasound-based technique called subharmonic-aided pressure estimation (SHAPE) to measure bladder pressure as a part of a cystometrogram (CMG) in a urodynamic test (ie, pressure-flow study). SHAPE is based on the principle that subharmonic emissions from ultrasound contrast microbubbles (MBs) decrease linearly with an increase in ambient pressure. We hypothesize that, using the SHAPE technique, we can measure voiding bladder pressure catheter-free.

Transparency practices at the FDA: A barrier to global health.

Data sharing among regulators must be "business as usual".