Internally Formed Preferences for Options only Influence Initial Decisions in Gambling Tasks, while the Gambling Outcomes do not Alter these Preferences.

All humans must engage in decision-making. Decision-making processes can be broadly classified into internally guided decision-making (IDM), which is determined by individuals' internal value criteria, such as preference, or externally guided decision-making (EDM), which is determined by environmental external value criteria, such as monetary rewards. However, real-life decisions are never made simply using one kind of decision-making, and the relationship between IDM and EDM remains unclear. This study had individuals perform gambling tasks requiring the EDM using stimuli that formed preferences through the preference judgment task as the IDM. Computational model analysis revealed that strong preferences in the IDM affected initial choice behavior in the EDM. Moreover, through the analysis of the subjective preference evaluation after the gambling tasks, we found that even when stimuli that were preferred in the IDM were perceived as less valuable in the EDM, the preference for IDM was maintained after EDM. These results indicate that although internal criteria, such as preferences, influence EDM, the results show that internal and external criteria differ.

Experimental verification of fiber coupling characteristics for FSO downlinks from the International Space Station.

Free-space optical (FSO) systems are compulsory to realize high capacity and interference-free communication links from low-Earth orbit (LEO) satellite constellations as well as spacecraft and space stations to the Earth. To be integrated with high-capacity ground networks, the collected portion of the incident beam should be coupled into an optical fiber. To accurately evaluate the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) and bit-error rate (BER) performance metrics, the probability density function (PDF) of fiber coupling efficiency (CE) must be determined. Previous studies have experimentally verified the CE PDF for a single-mode fiber, however, there is no such investigation for the CE PDF of a multi-mode fiber (MMF) in a LEO-to-ground FSO downlink. In this paper, for the first time, the CE PDF for a 200-µm MMF is experimentally investigated using data from an FSO downlink from the Small Optical Link for International Space Station (SOLISS) terminal to a 40-cm sub-aperture optical ground station (OGS) supported by a fine-tracking system. An average CE of 5.45 dB was also achieved given that the alignment between SOLISS and OGS was not optimal. In addition, using the angle-of-arrival (AoA) and received power data, the statistical characteristics such as channel coherence time, power spectral density, spectrogram, and PDFs of AoA, beam misalignments, and atmospheric turbulence-induced fluctuations are revealed and compared with the state-of-the-art theoretical background.

From neuronal to psychological noise - Long-range temporal correlations in EEG intrinsic activity reduce noise in internally-guided decision making.

Our personal internal preferences while making decisions are usually consistent. Recent psychological studies, however, show observable variability of internal criteria occurs by random noise. The neural correlates of said random noise - an instance of 'psychological noise' - yet remain unclear. Combining simulation, behavioral, and neural approaches, our study investigated the psychological and neural correlates of such random noise in our internal criteria during decision making. We applied well-established decision-making tasks which relied on either internal criteria - occupation choice task as internally-guided decision making (IDM) - or external criteria - salary judgment task as externally-guided decision making (EDM). Subjects underwent EEG for resting state and task-evoked activity during IDM and EDM. We measured resting state long-range temporal correlation (LRTC) in the alpha frequency range as the index of neuronal noise. Based on our simulation, we identified a measure of psychological noise (as distinguished from true preference change) in IDM. The main finding shows that the indices for psychological noise are directly related to frontocentral LRTC in the alpha range. Higher degrees of frontocentral LRTC, which index lower neuronal noise, were related to lower degrees of psychological noise during IDM. This was not found during EDM. Resting state LRTC was also related to task-evoked activity, such as conflict-related negativity, during IDM only. Taken together, our data demonstrate, for the first time, the direct relationship between neuronal noise in the brain's intrinsic activity and psychological noise in the internal criteria of our decision making.

The temporal signature of self: Temporal measures of resting-state EEG predict self-consciousness.

The self is the core of our mental life. Previous investigations have demonstrated a strong neural overlap between self-related activity and resting state activity. This suggests that information about self-relatedness is encoded in our brain's spontaneous activity. The exact neuronal mechanisms of such "rest-self containment," however, remain unclear. The present EEG study investigated temporal measures of resting state EEG to relate them to self-consciousness. This was obtained with the self-consciousness scale (SCS) which measures Private, Public, and Social dimensions of self. We demonstrate positive correlations between Private self-consciousness and three temporal measures of resting state activity: scale-free activity as indexed by the power-law exponent (PLE), the auto-correlation window (ACW), and modulation index (MI). Specifically, higher PLE, longer ACW, and stronger MI were related to higher degrees of Private self-consciousness. Finally, conducting eLORETA for spatial tomography, we found significant correlation of Private self-consciousness with activity in cortical midline structures such as the perigenual anterior cingulate cortex and posterior cingulate cortex. These results were reinforced with a data-driven analysis; a machine learning algorithm accurately predicted an individual as having a "high" or "low" Private self-consciousness score based on these measures of the brain's spatiotemporal structure. In conclusion, our results demonstrate that Private self-consciousness is related to the temporal structure of resting state activity as featured by temporal nestedness (PLE), temporal continuity (ACW), and temporal integration (MI). Our results support the hypothesis that self-related information is temporally contained in the brain's resting state. "Rest-self containment" can thus be featured by a temporal signature.

Affective auditory stimulus database: An expanded version of the International Affective Digitized Sounds (IADS-E).

Using appropriate stimuli to evoke emotions is especially important for researching emotion. Psychologists have provided several standardized affective stimulus databases-such as the International Affective Picture System (IAPS) and the Nencki Affective Picture System (NAPS) as visual stimulus databases, as well as the International Affective Digitized Sounds (IADS) and the Montreal Affective Voices as auditory stimulus databases for emotional experiments. However, considering the limitations of the existing auditory stimulus database studies, research using auditory stimuli is relatively limited compared with the studies using visual stimuli. First, the number of sample sounds is limited, making it difficult to equate across emotional conditions and semantic categories. Second, some artificially created materials (music or human voice) may fail to accurately drive the intended emotional processes. Our principal aim was to expand existing auditory affective sample database to sufficiently cover natural sounds. We asked 207 participants to rate 935 sounds (including the sounds from the IADS-2) using the Self-Assessment Manikin (SAM) and three basic-emotion rating scales. The results showed that emotions in sounds can be distinguished on the affective rating scales, and the stability of the evaluations of sounds revealed that we have successfully provided a larger corpus of natural, emotionally evocative auditory stimuli, covering a wide range of semantic categories. Our expanded, standardized sound sample database may promote a wide range of research in auditory systems and the possible interactions with other sensory modalities, encouraging direct reliable comparisons of outcomes from different researchers in the field of psychology.

Increased amygdala reactivity following early life stress: a potential resilience enhancer role.

BACKGROUND: Amygdala hyper-reactivity is sometimes assumed to be a vulnerability factor that predates depression; however, in healthy people, who experience early life stress but do not become depressed, it may represent a resilience mechanism. We aimed to test these hypothesis examining whether increased amygdala activity in association with a history of early life stress (ELS) was negatively or positively associated with depressive symptoms and impact of negative life event stress in never-depressed adults. METHODS: Twenty-four healthy participants completed an individually tailored negative mood induction task during functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) assessment along with evaluation of ELS. RESULTS: Mood change and amygdala reactivity were increased in never-depressed participants who reported ELS compared to participants who reported no ELS. Yet, increased amygdala reactivity lowered effects of ELS on depressive symptoms and negative life events stress. Amygdala reactivity also had positive functional connectivity with the bilateral DLPFC, motor cortex and striatum in people with ELS during sad memory recall. CONCLUSIONS: Increased amygdala activity in those with ELS was associated with decreased symptoms and increased neural features, consistent with emotion regulation, suggesting that preservation of robust amygdala reactions may reflect a stress buffering or resilience enhancing factor against depression and negative stressful events.

Breeding of a new potato variety 'Nagasaki Kogane' with high eating quality, high carotenoid content, and resistance to diseases and pests.

'Nagasaki Kogane' is a new potato variety bred from a cross between 'Saikai 35' as a female parent and 'Saikai 33' as a male. 'Saikai 35' is resistant to bacterial wilt, contains the H1 and Rychc genes for resistance to the potato cyst nematode (PCN) and potato virus Y (PVY), respectively, and has high carotenoid content, while 'Saikai 33' has large and high-yielding tubers and is resistant to both bacterial wilt and PCN. The carotenoid content of 'Nagasaki Kogane' is higher than that of 'Dejima', a common double cropping variety. The taste quality of steamed 'Nagasaki Kogane' is comparable to that of 'Inca-no-mezame' tubers, which has high levels of carotenoid, and superior to 'Nishiyutaka', another popular double cropping variety. 'Nagasaki Kogane' is suitable for French fries, because its tuber has high starch content. The marketable yield of 'Nagasaki Kogane' was higher than that of 'Inca-no-mezame' in spring cropping, although it was lower than that of 'Nishiyutaka' in double cropping regions. 'Nagasaki Kogane' tubers are larger on average than 'Inca-no-mezame' tubers in spring cropping. Moreover, the 'Nagasaki Kogane' variety is resistant to PCN and PVY, and exhibits a high level of resistance to bacterial wilt.

Challenges of breeding potato cultivars to grow in various environments and to meet different demands.

The potato (Solanum tuberosum L.) is cultivated all year round in Japan by using four types of cropping: summer and winter croppings, and double cropping in spring and fall. In each cropping season, growth conditions such as temperature, day length, and growing period, differ drastically; thus, different cultivars adapted to each environment are required. Breeding stations are located in both summer cropping areas and double cropping areas, and cultivars suitable for each cropping system are developed. The required cultivars differ according to cropping type and according to use such as table use, food processing, and starch production. The qualities necessary for each purpose differ and are therefore evaluated accordingly. Improvements in pest and disease resistance and in yield abilities are important as common breeding targets for all purposes. To develop potato cultivars that meet different needs, breeders have continued efforts to improve these traits. In this review, we introduce our approaches to developing new potato cultivars. We also discuss problems predicted in the future and introduce our efforts on broadening genetic diversity.

Resting-state EEG power predicts conflict-related brain activity in internally guided but not in externally guided decision-making.

Most experimental studies of decision-making have specifically examined situations in which a single correct answer exists (externally guided decision-making). Along with such externally guided decision-making, there are instances of decision-making in which no correct answer based on external circumstances is available for the subject (internally guided decision-making, e.g. preference judgment). We compared these two different types of decision-making in terms of conflict-monitoring and their relation with resting-state brain activity. Current electroencephalography (EEG) data demonstrated that conflict-related N2 amplitudes (i.e., difference between large-conflict and small-conflict conditions) in externally guided decision-making were modulated by the type of external stimulus (i.e., large-conflict stimulus pair or small-conflict stimulus pair) but were not found to be correlated with resting-state brain activity (i.e. resting-state EEG power). In contrast, conflict-related N2 amplitudes in internally guided decision-making were found to be correlated with resting-state brain activity, but were not found to be modulated by the type of stimulus itself: the degree to which the type of external stimulus modulates the conflict during stimulus encoding varies according to individual differences in intrinsic brain activity. Considering those results comprehensively, we demonstrate for the first time resting-state and stimulus-related differences between externally and internally guided decision-making.

Prior cognitive activity implicitly modulates subsequent emotional responses to subliminally presented emotional stimuli.

It has been reported that engagement in several kinds of cognitive activity can successfully inhibit unpleasant emotions. In this study, we tried to replicate the previous finding that cognitive activity can modulate subsequent psychological and physiological emotional processes and to investigate whether prior cognitive activity can attenuate implicit emotional processes triggered by subliminal emotional stimuli. Sixty students were randomly divided into three groups (cognitive task group, noncognitive task group, control group). The cognitive task group was asked to engage in an n-back task, while the control group was asked to stay calm. The noncognitive task group was asked to do a handgrip-squeezing task. All participants then engaged in a version of a subliminal affective priming task where they were unconsciously exposed to affectively negative pictures. The cognitive task group showed lower negative experiences after the subliminal affective priming task and a substantial reduction in their heart rate responses, as compared with the other groups. These results provide evidence that engagement in cognitive activity can attenuate emotional processes in an automatic and unconscious manner.

Top-Down Influence Leads to a Reduced Sense of Body Ownership in Individuals With Depersonalization Tendencies: A Focus on Full Body Illusion.

Sense of body ownership, that is, the feeling that "my body belongs to me," has been examined by both the rubber hand illusion (RHI) and full body illusion (FBI). In a study that examined the relationship between RHI and depersonalization, a symptom in which people experience a lower sense of body ownership, people with a high depersonalization tendency experienced RHI through the bottom-up process of visual-tactile integration. Why is it that people with depersonalization feel a lower sense of body ownership over their bodies? Case studies of depersonalization suggest that the top-down cognition in people with depersonalization may make them less likely to feel a sense of body ownership. However, the top-down influence on the sense of body ownership in depersonalization has not yet been experimentally demonstrated. By incorporating top-down manipulation (e.g., instructing participants to regard a fake body as their own) into the FBI procedure, we aimed to clarify the cause of the reduced sense of body ownership in people with a high depersonalization tendency. The FBI procedure was conducted in a virtual reality environment using an avatar as a fake body. The avatar was presented from a third-person perspective, and visual-tactile stimuli were presented to create an illusion. To examine the degree of illusion, we measured the skin conductance responses to the fear stimulus presented after the visual-tactile stimuli presentation. The degree of depersonalization was measured using the Japanese version of the Cambridge Depersonalization Scale. To manipulate the top-down influence, we provided self-association instructions before the presentation of the visual-tactile stimuli. We predicted that the higher the degree of depersonalization, the lower the degree of illusion in the self-association instruction. The results showed that participants with a higher depersonalization tendency had a lower degree of illusion (rho = -0.424, p = 0.035) in the self-association condition. This indicates that in people with a high depersonalization tendency, top-down cognition of the body as their own leads to a decrease in the sense of body ownership.

Impact of Cardiac Interoception on the Self-Prioritization Effect.

Self-relevant information is processed faster and more accurately than non-self-relevant information. Such a bias is developed even for newly associated information with the self, which is also known as the self-prioritization effect (SPE). Interoception, which refers to the overall processing of information from within the body, is crucial for self-relevant processing; however, its role in SPE remains unexplored. In this study, we investigated the relationship between the magnitude of SPE and interoceptive accuracy (IAc), defined as one's ability to accurately perceive one's own interoceptive state. Additionally, to explore the causal relationship, we measured SPE by presenting self- or other-relevant stimuli based on the participant's cardiac cycle in the shape-label matching task. We demonstrated that IAc was negatively correlated with the magnitude of SPE in terms of discrimination of the relevance of the stimuli. In addition, a correlation was observed only when the stimuli were presented during cardiac systole. Furthermore, IAc was negatively correlated with the processing of self-relevant stimuli but not with other-relevant stimuli. Collectively, our results show that individuals with higher IAc have relatively lower discriminative sensitivity to newly and temporary associated self-relevant stimuli presented during the accentuation of cardiac interoceptive information. Although SPE is a phenomenon in which newly self-associated stimuli are preferentially processed, our results suggest that individuals with higher IAc prioritized processing interoceptive information over temporarily associated self-relevant external information. Conversely, previous studies using paradigms other than the shape-label matching paradigm with familiar self-relevant stimuli, such as self-face, reported that interoceptive information enhances the processing of self-relevant stimuli. Whether interoceptive information enhances the processing of external self-relevant information may depend on the familiarity with the self-relevant stimuli and the experimental paradigm.

Implicit attenuation of subsequent emotion by cognitive activity.

The successful regulation of emotion relies heavily on executive function. Until very recently, however, the specific effects of executive function activity on other processes havereceived relatively little empirical attention.The link between executive function and emotional responses suggests that the activation of executive function may play an important role in the attenuation of emotional responses. We conducted twoexperiments to test the hypothesis that decrements in emotional responses following cognitive task performance might be caused, at least in part, by the activation of executive function.First, we sought to test whetherthe activation of executive function reducedemotional responsesimplicitly, without any volitional effort.Next, we sought to examine the link between prior activation of executivefunction and the attenuation of subsequent emotional responses, by comparing the effects of an executive-function-demanding task with the effects of a task that is equally effortful but does not engage executive function.We discuss our results in the context of the role of executive function in the attenuation of emotion.

Computational modeling of choice-induced preference change: A Reinforcement-Learning-based approach.

The value learning process has been investigated using decision-making tasks with a correct answer specified by the external environment (externally guided decision-making, EDM). In EDM, people are required to adjust their choices based on feedback, and the learning process is generally explained by the reinforcement learning (RL) model. In addition to EDM, value is learned through internally guided decision-making (IDM), in which no correct answer defined by external circumstances is available, such as preference judgment. In IDM, it has been believed that the value of the chosen item is increased and that of the rejected item is decreased (choice-induced preference change; CIPC). An RL-based model called the choice-based learning (CBL) model had been proposed to describe CIPC, in which the values of chosen and/or rejected items are updated as if own choice were the correct answer. However, the validity of the CBL model has not been confirmed by fitting the model to IDM behavioral data. The present study aims to examine the CBL model in IDM. We conducted simulations, a preference judgment task for novel contour shapes, and applied computational model analyses to the behavioral data. The results showed that the CBL model with both the chosen and rejected value's updated were a good fit for the IDM behavioral data compared to the other candidate models. Although previous studies using subjective preference ratings had repeatedly reported changes only in one of the values of either the chosen or rejected items, we demonstrated for the first time both items' value changes were based solely on IDM choice behavioral data with computational model analyses.

Correction: Computational modeling of choice-induced preference change: A Reinforcement-Learning-based approach.

[This corrects the article DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0244434.].

Association between long-range temporal correlations in intrinsic EEG activity and subjective sense of identity.

The long-range temporal correlation (LRTC) in resting-state intrinsic brain activity is known to be associated with temporal behavioral patterns, including decision making based on internal criteria such as self-knowledge. However, the association between the neuronal LRTC and the subjective sense of identity remains to be explored; in other words, whether our subjective sense of consistent self across time relates to the temporal consistency of neural activity. The present study examined the relationship between the LRTC of resting-state scalp electroencephalography (EEG) and a subjective sense of identity measured by the Erikson Psychosocial Stage Inventory (EPSI). Consistent with our prediction based on previous studies of neuronal-behavioral relationships, the frontocentral alpha LRTC correlated negatively with identity confusion. Moreover, from the descriptive analyses, centroparietal beta LRTC showed negative correlations with identity confusion, and frontal theta LRTC showed positive relationships with identity synthesis. These results suggest that more temporal consistency (reversely, less random noise) in intrinsic brain activity is associated with less confused and better-synthesized identity. Our data provide further evidence that the LRTC of intrinsic brain activity might serve as a noise suppression mechanism at the psychological level.

Cognitive Reappraisal Facilitates Decentering: A Longitudinal Cross-Lagged Analysis Study.

Previous studies have suggested that cognitive reappraisal, which is an effective emotion regulation strategy, enhances decentering. On the other hand, other studies have implied the reverse in regard to this relationship: that decentering supports cognitive reappraisal. However, these possibilities have not yet been examined empirically. In the present study, we investigated the causal relationship between decentering and cognitive reappraisal by conducting two wave cross-lagged analysis. One hundred and thirty-eight Japanese university students responded to a questionnaire comprising measures of decentering and cognitive reappraisal tendency; the questionnaire was administered on two occasions, with an interval of 1 month. Cross-lagged analysis indicated the positive effect of cognitive reappraisal on decentering; however, the reverse possibility, that decentering influences cognitive reappraisal, was not significant. These results suggested that habitual use of cognitive reappraisal fosters decentering.

Resting-state theta/beta ratio is associated with distraction but not with reappraisal.

Although previous research indicated that resting-state theta/beta ratio (TBR) is related to unspecified emotion regulation (ER), the ER strategies associated with TBR remain unclear. We examined whether representative ER strategies-distraction and reappraisal-are related to resting-state TBR. Data from sixty-one healthy Japanese university students were recorded in an eyes-closed resting-state with an electroencephalogram (EEG). Their self-reported tendencies of distraction and reappraisal were assessed. Rank-correlation analyses revealed that lower frontal and parietal TBR were associated with high distraction tendency. However, frontal and parietal TBR were not correlated with reappraisal. Given that TBR is linked to attention control, distraction may be associated with TBR. Consequently, TBR can be used to identify persons with ER difficulties, based on the results of this study.

Activation of self-knowledge reduces conflict during occupational choice: an ERP study.

We investigated whether the activation of self-knowledge reduces conflict during occupational choice, which can elicit many correct answers. Conflict was measured via event-related brain potentials (ERPs). Results of this study showed that activation of self-knowledge reduces conflict during occupational choice. Our results suggest that, in a situation in which two or more possible correct answers exist, people use self-knowledge as a benchmark to reduce conflict by biasing either choice of behavior.

Interindividual neural differences in moral decision-making are mediated by alpha power and delta/theta phase coherence.

As technology in Artificial Intelligence has developed, the question of how to program driverless cars to respond to an emergency has arisen. It was recently shown that approval of the consequential behavior of driverless cars varied with the number of lives saved and showed interindividual differences, with approval increasing alongside the number of lives saved. In the present study, interindividual differences in individualized moral decision-making at both the behavioral and neural level were investigated using EEG. It was found that alpha event-related spectral perturbation (ERSP) and delta/theta phase-locking - intertrial coherence (ITC) and phase-locking value (PLV) - play a central role in mediating interindividual differences in Moral decision-making. In addition, very late alpha activity differences between individualized and shared stimuli, and delta/theta ITC, where shown to be closely related to reaction time and subjectively perceived emotional distress. This demonstrates that interindividual differences in Moral decision-making are mediated neuronally by various markers - late alpha ERSP, and delta/theta ITC - as well as psychologically by reaction time and perceived emotional distress. Our data show, for the first time, how and according to which neuronal and behavioral measures interindividual differences in Moral dilemmas can be measured.