Brain imaging research shows how unconscious
processing improves decision-making published on February 13, 2013 in Neuroscience as well as Medical Xpress.
(Medical Xpress) New brain imaging research from Carnegie Mellon University provides some of the first evidence showing how the brain unconsciously processes decision information in ways that lead to improved decision making. Published in the journal Social Cognitive and Affective
(Medical Xpress) New brain imaging research from Carnegie Mellon University provides some of the first evidence showing how the brain unconsciously processes decision information in ways that lead to improved decision making. Published in the journal Social Cognitive and Affective
Neuroscience,
the study found that the brain regions responsible for making decisions
continue to be active even when the conscious brain is distracted with a
different task. This image shows unconscious activity in two parts of the
brain, the left visual cortex and right prefrontal cortex. When faced with a
difficult decision, it is often suggested to "sleep on it" or take a
break from thinking about the decision in order to gain clarity.
But
new brain imaging research from Carnegie Mellon University, published in the
journal "Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience," finds that the
brain regions responsible for making decisions continue to be active even when
the conscious brain is distracted with a different task.
The
research provides some of the first evidence showing how the brain
unconsciously processes decision information in ways that lead to improved
decision-making. "This research begins to chip away at the mystery of our
unconscious brains and decision-making," said J. David Creswell, assistant
professor of psychology in CMU's Dietrich College of Humanities and Social
Sciences and director of the Health and Human Performance Laboratory. "It
shows that brain regions important for decision-making remain active even while
our brains may be simultaneously engaged in unrelated tasks, such as thinking
about a math problem.
What's
most intriguing about this finding is that participants did not have any
awareness that their brains were still working on the decision problem while
they were engaged in an unrelated task." For the study, Creswell, recent
CMU graduate James K. Bursley and Northeastern University's Ajay B. Satpute
presented 27 healthy adults with information about cars and other items while
undergoing neuroimaging.
Then,
before being asked to make decisions about the items, the participants had to
complete a difficult distractor task—memorizing sequences of numbers—to prevent
them from consciously thinking about the decision information.
The
results included three main findings. First, the team confirmed previous
research demonstrating that a brief period of distraction—in this case two
minutes—produced higher quality decisions about the cars and other items. But
did this effect occur because the distraction period provided an opportunity
for the brain to take a break from decision-making and then return to the
problem with a fresh look? Or alternatively, does the brain continue to
unconsciously process decision information during this distraction period?
This research supports the latter unconscious
processing explanation. When the participants were initially learning information
about the cars and other items, the neuroimaging results showed activation in
the visual and prefrontal cortices, regions that are known to be responsible
for learning and decision-making. Additionally, during the distractor task, both
the visual and prefrontal cortices continued to be active—or reactivated—even
though the brain was consciously focused on number memorization. Third, the
results showed that the amount of reactivation within the visual and prefrontal
cortices during the distractor task predicted the degree to which participants
made better decisions, such as picking the best car in the set. "We all
face difficult problems we need to solve on a regular basis,"
Creswell
said. "Whether it's buying a new car, finding a new apartment to rent, or
seeking out a new dating partner on social networking sites. This study
provides some of the first clues for how our brains process this information
for effective problem-solving and decision-making."
This
study is really a starting point. We also are using brain imaging to see if we
find the same reactivation patterns in learning tasks that we saw here in
decision-making." Journal reference: Social Cognitive and Affective
Neuroscience Provided by Carnegie Mellon
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