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The Neural Basis of Shared Preference Learning

Harry Farmer, Uri Hertz, Antonia Hamilton
doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/570762
Harry Farmer
1Department of Psychology, University of Bath
2Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, University College London
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  • For correspondence: h.farmer@bath.ac.uk
Uri Hertz
3Department of Cognitive Sciences, University of Haifa, Israel
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Antonia Hamilton
2Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, University College London
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Abstract

During our daily lives, we often learn about the similarity of the traits and preferences of others to our own and use that information during our social interactions. However, it is unclear how the brain represents similarity between the self and others. One possible mechanism is to track similarity to oneself regardless of the identity of the other (Similarity account); an alternative is to track each confederate in terms of consistency of the similarity to the self, with respect to the choices they have made before (consistency account). Our study combined fMRI and computational modelling of reinforcement learning (RL) to investigate the neural processes that underlie learning about preference similarity. Participants chose which of two pieces of artwork they preferred and saw the choices of one confederate who usually shared their preference and another who usually did not. We modelled neural activation with RL models based on the similarity and consistency accounts. Data showed more brain regions whose activity pattern fits with the consistency account, specifically, areas linked to reward and social cognition. Our findings suggest that impressions of other people can be calculated in a person-specific manner which assumes that each individual behaves consistently with their past choices.

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Posted March 11, 2019.
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The Neural Basis of Shared Preference Learning
Harry Farmer, Uri Hertz, Antonia Hamilton
bioRxiv 570762; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/570762
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The Neural Basis of Shared Preference Learning
Harry Farmer, Uri Hertz, Antonia Hamilton
bioRxiv 570762; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/570762

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