The Role of Behavioral Extinction in Animat Action Selection

The role of an alerting system is to make the system operator (e.g., pilot) aware of an impending hazard or unsafe state so the hazard can be avoided or managed successfully. A review of 46 commercial aviation accidents (between 1998 and 2014) revealed that, in the vast majority of events, either the hazard was not alerted or relevant hazard alerting occurred but failed to aid the flight crew sufficiently. For this set of events, alerting system failures were placed in one of five phases: Detection, Understanding, Action Selection, Prioritization, and Execution. This study also reviewed the evolution of alerting system schemes in commercial aviation, which revealed naïve assumptions about pilot reliability in monitoring flight path parameters; specifically, pilot monitoring was assumed to be more effective than it actually is. Examples are provided of the types of alerting system failures that have occurred, and recommendations are provided for alerting system improvements.

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The role of selective attention and action selection in the development of multiple action capabilities

Connection Science ◽

10.1080/09540091.2014.942597 ◽

2014 ◽

Vol 26 (4) ◽

pp. 389-402 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Luca Simione ◽

Stefano Nolfi

Keyword(s):

Selective Attention ◽

Action Selection ◽

Action Capabilities

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Metacognitive awareness of difficulty in action selection: the role of the cingulo-opercular network

10.1101/641340 ◽

2019 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Martyn Teuchies ◽

Kobe Desender ◽

Wouter de Baene ◽

Jelle Demanet ◽

Marcel Brass

Keyword(s):

Reaction Times ◽

Action Selection ◽

Metacognitive Awareness ◽

Direct Access ◽

Response Priming ◽

Cognitive States ◽

Priming Paradigm ◽

Metacognitive Experience ◽

Increased Activity

AbstractThe question whether and how we are able to monitor our own cognitive states (metacognition) has been a matter of debate for decades. Do we have direct access to our cognitive processes or can we only infer them indirectly based on their consequences? In the current study, we wanted to investigate the brain circuits that underlie the metacognitive experience of fluency in action selection. To manipulate action-selection fluency we used a subliminal response priming paradigm. On each trial, participants additionally engaged in the metacognitive process of rating how hard they felt it was to respond to the target stimulus. Despite having no conscious awareness of the prime, results showed that participants rated incompatible trials (during which subliminal primes interfered with the required response) to be more difficult than compatible trials (where primes facilitated the required response) reflecting metacognitive awareness of difficulty. This increased sense of subjective difficulty was mirrored by increased activity in the rostral cingulate zone (RCZ) and the anterior insula, two regions that are functionally closely connected. Importantly, these reflected unique activations and were not explained by reaction times or prime-response compatibility. We interpret these findings in light of a possible grounding of the metacognitive judgement of fluency in action selection in interoceptive signals resulting from increased effort.

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Metacognitive Awareness of Difficulty in Action Selection: The Role of the Cingulo-opercular Network

Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience ◽

10.1162/jocn_a_01773 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 1-11

Author(s):

Kobe Desender ◽

Martyn Teuchies ◽

Carlos Gonzalez Garcia ◽

Wouter De Baene ◽

Jelle Demanet ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Action Selection ◽

Metacognitive Awareness ◽

Direct Access ◽

Response Priming ◽

Metacognitive Judgment ◽

Cognitive States ◽

Priming Paradigm ◽

Human Participants ◽

Metacognitive Experience

Abstract The question whether and how we are able to monitor our own cognitive states (metacognition) has been a matter of debate for decades. Do we have direct access to our cognitive processes, or can we only infer them indirectly based on their consequences? In the current study, we wanted to investigate the brain circuits that underlie the metacognitive experience of fluency in action selection. To manipulate action-selection fluency, we used a subliminal response priming paradigm. On each trial, both male and female human participants additionally engaged in the metacognitive process of rating how hard they felt it was to respond to the target stimulus. Despite having no conscious awareness of the prime, results showed that participants rated incompatible trials (during which subliminal primes interfered with the required response) to be more difficult than compatible trials (where primes facilitated the required response), reflecting metacognitive awareness of difficulty. This increased sense of subjective difficulty was mirrored by increased activity in the rostral cingulate zone and the anterior insula, two regions that are functionally closely connected. Importantly, this reflected activations that were unique to subjective difficulty ratings and were not explained by RTs or prime–response compatibility. We interpret these findings in light of a possible grounding of the metacognitive judgment of fluency in action selection in interoceptive signals resulting from increased effort.

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Two-phase model of the basal ganglia: implications for discontinuous control of the motor system

Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B Biological Sciences ◽

10.1098/rstb.2013.0489 ◽

2014 ◽

Vol 369 (1655) ◽

pp. 20130489 ◽

Cited By ~ 9

Author(s):

John Lisman

Keyword(s):

Basal Ganglia ◽

Motor System ◽

Selection Process ◽

Action Selection ◽

Positive Outcome ◽

Second Phase ◽

Two Phase ◽

Single Action ◽

Eligibility Trace

In this article, I point out that simple one-phase models of the role of the basal ganglia in action selection have a problem. Furthermore, I suggest a solution with major implications for the organization of the action-selection and motor systems. In current models, the striatum evaluates multiple potential actions by adding biases based on previous conditioning. These biases may arise in both the direct (bias for) and indirect (bias against) pathways. Together, these biases influence which action is ultimately chosen. For efficient conditioning to occur, a positive outcome must selectively strengthen the striatal bias for the chosen action (via a dopaminergic mechanism). This is problematic, however, because all potential action choices have influenced firing patterns in striatal cells during the selection process; it is therefore unclear how the synapses that represent the chosen plan could be selectively strengthened. I suggest a simple solution in which the striatum has two functional phases. In the first phase, the basal ganglia provide biases for multiple potential actions (using both the direct and indirect pathways), leading to the choice of a single action in the cortex. In the second phase, an efference copy of the chosen action is sent to the striatum, where it contributes to the establishment of the eligibility trace for that action. This trace, when acted on by subsequent dopaminergic reinforcement, leads to specific strengthening of the bias only for the chosen action. Consistent with this model, recordings show post-choice imposition onto the striatum of signals corresponding to the chosen action. The existence of dual phases of basal ganglia function implies that decisions about action choice are sent to the motor system in a discontinuous manner. This would not be problematic if the motor system also operated discontinuously. I will review evidence suggesting that this is the case, notably that action is organized by approximately 10 Hz oscillations.

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