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According to a new study by a team of psychologists and neuroscientists from the University of Pennsylvania, people learn better when presented an unexpected reward rather than expected ones.  A computer-base card game is presented with microelectrodes to observe neuronal activity of the brain. The player was given two different color cards, one red and one blue, in which he or she has to choose between. If the draw card yield a reward, a stack of gold coins appear along with audible ring or cash register. However, if the draw card did not yield a reward or if there was no draw, the screen goes blank and there will be a buzz.  There is a higher probability yielding a financial reward for one card than the other. The research suggests that neurons in the human substantia nigra (SN) play a central role in reward-base learning.

Another study by Dr. Zaghloul and Michael J. Kahana, and Gordon Baltuch, Md, PhD, associate professor of neurosurgery, in a unique collaboration among Psychology Neurosurgery, and Bioengineering researchers was conducted on patients with Parkinson’s disease. Microelectrode recordings were obtained during deep brain stimulation surgery. Patients with Parkinson’s disease (Parkinson’s disease belongs to a group of conditions called motor system disorders, which are the result of the loss of dopamine-producing brain cells) shows impaired learning from both positive and negative feedback due to degenerative nature of their disease and the decrease in number of dopaminergic neurons. Dopaminergic neurons drive a larger basal ganglia circuit and are activated in response to reward and depressed after omission of reward.

Source: Medical News Today

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