PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Alessandro Tomassini
AU  - Darren Price
AU  - Jiaxiang Zhang
AU  - James B Rowe
TI  - On the evolution of neural decisions from uncertain visual input to uncertain actions
AID  - 10.1101/803049
DP  - 2019 Jan 01
TA  - bioRxiv
PG  - 803049
4099  - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2019/10/13/803049.short
4100  - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2019/10/13/803049.full
AB  - Everyday behaviors are governed by decisions, about what we see and which actions to take. Here we present a model of the evolution of decisions from visual perception to voluntary action, in humans. We combine accumulation-to-threshold modelling of visuomotor decisions under different levels of uncertainty, with electro-/magneto-encephalographic recording, to trace the sequence of localised decision processes, separately encoded in beta and gamma frequency ranges, and the flow of information through cortical networks. We show that evidence accumulation in motor and prefrontal cortex, to resolve action uncertainty, begins within 100ms from the onset of visual evidence accumulation, before the threshold in sensory regions is reached suggesting a continuous (rather than sequential) processing of information from perception to action. Moreover, the direction of flow of information between sensory, motor and association cortices, is opposite in beta and gamma frequency bands. The frequency, temporal and spatial distributions of the decision processes reveal widespread hierarchical information processing networks through which we resolve trial-by-trial action decisions despite environmental uncertainty.