Nature Communications (Mar 2023)

Neuro-computational mechanisms and individual biases in action-outcome learning under moral conflict

  • Laura Fornari,
  • Kalliopi Ioumpa,
  • Alessandra D. Nostro,
  • Nathan J. Evans,
  • Lorenzo De Angelis,
  • Sebastian P. H. Speer,
  • Riccardo Paracampo,
  • Selene Gallo,
  • Michael Spezio,
  • Christian Keysers,
  • Valeria Gazzola

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-023-36807-3
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 14, no. 1
pp. 1 – 18

Abstract

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How we juggle morally conflicting outcomes during learning remains unknown. Here, by comparing variants of reinforcement learning models, the authors show that participants differ substantially in their preference, with some choosing actions that benefit themselves while others choose actions that prevent harm.