Available online 17 April 2024, 100223

We examined age-related differences in valuation and cognitive control circuits during value-based decision-making.

13-year-olds (N=25) and 17-year-olds (N=22) made a metacognitive choice to be tested or not on an upcoming learning task, based on reward and difficulty associated with word-pairs. To investigate whether these determinants of subjective value are differently processed at different ages, we performed region-of-interest(ROI)-based analyses of task-related and functional connectivity data.

Results: We observed age-related differences in responsiveness of valuation structures (amygdala, ventral striatum, ventromedial prefrontal cortex) and caudate nucleus, with activity modulated by reward in 13-year-olds, while in 17-year-olds activity being responsive to difficulty. These accompanied age-related differences in functional connectivity between medial prefrontal and striatal/amygdala seeds.

These results are in line with current views that sensitivity changes for reward and difficulty during adolescence are the result of a maturational switch in effort-related signalling in the cognitive control circuit, which increasingly regulates value-signalling structures.

Adolescence

decision-making

fMRI

self-regulated learning

valuation

© 2024 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier GmbH.