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The neural basis of perceptual and cognitve pleasure| old_uid | 911 |
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| title | The neural basis of perceptual and cognitve pleasure |
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| start_date | 2006/03/22 |
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| schedule | 16h |
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| online | no |
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| summary | Our selection of which movie to see or book to read, whether to stay in a conversation at a party or freshen our drink, and where to look with our next fixation is decidedly non random. What controls this selection when an individual is not engaged in the classical survival modes of satisfying hunger, avoiding harm, etc? And how can this expression of interest be manifested in real time, at the rate of three visual fixations per second? The surprising discovery of a gradient of mu-opioid receptors in cortical areas associated with perception and cognition may provide the key for understanding the spontaneous selectivity of perception and thought. These receptors are sparse in the early sensory areas and dense in the association areas. If we assume that experiences are preferred that maximize this opioid activity, then preferred inputs will tend to be those that are richly interpretable (not just complex) insofar as they would produce high activation of associative connections in areas that have the greatest density of mu-opioid receptors. Once an input is experienced, however, competitive learning would serve to reduce associative activity and hence opioid activity, resulting in habituation and boredom. Behavioral and neuroimaging tests have confirmed this account. This system serves to maximize the rate at which we acquire new but interpretable information--rendering us infovores--and leads to an understanding of the neural basis of aesthetics. |
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| responsibles | Bishop |
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