Timing in reward and decision processes

Abstract

Sensitivity to time, including the time of reward, guides the behaviour of all organisms. Recent research suggests that all major reward structures of the brain process the time of reward occurrence, including midbrain dopamine neurons, striatum, frontal cortex and amygdala. Neuronal reward responses in dopamine neurons, striatum and frontal cortex show temporal discounting of reward value. The prediction error signal of dopamine neurons includes the predicted time of rewards. Neurons in the striatum, frontal cortex and amygdala show responses to reward delivery and activities anticipating rewards that are sensitive to the predicted time of reward and the instantaneous reward probability. Together these data suggest that internal timing processes have several well characterized effects on neuronal reward processing.