Stress and decision making: effects on valuation, learning, and risk-taking

doi:10.1016/j.cobeha.2016.11.015

Current Opinion in Behavioral Sciences

Volume 14, April 2017, Pages 33-39

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cobeha.2016.11.015 Get rights and content

Highlights

•
Acute stress can impair valuation of reward information critical to decision making.
•
Acute stress influences a shift from goal-directed to habit-based decision making.
•
Effects of acute stress on risk-taking are mixed but promising for future studies.

A wide range of stressful experiences can influence human decision making in complex ways beyond the simple predictions of a fight-or-flight model. Recent advances may provide insight into this complicated interaction, potentially in directions that could result in translational applications. Early research suggests that stress exposure influences basic neural circuits involved in reward processing and learning, while also biasing decisions toward habit and modulating our propensity to engage in risk-taking. That said, a substantial array of theoretical and methodological considerations in research on the topic challenge strong cross study comparisons necessary for the field to move forward. In this review we examine the multifaceted stress construct in the context of human decision making, emphasizing stress’ effect on valuation, learning, and risk-taking.

Section snippets

The stress construct

Stress has classically been defined as ‘the non-specific response of the body to any demand for change’, an adaptive homeostatic function [3]. It is associated with parallel activation of two biological systems: the quick-acting sympathetic-adrenal-medullary (SAM) axis, and the slow-acting hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis [4]. Sympathetic nervous system reactivity and associated catecholamine (e.g., nor/adrenaline) release promote peripheral excitation that quickly returns to baseline

Stress and valuation: reward-related processing

A central axiom of DM research rests on the principle that people act to approach rewards and avoid punishments in their environment [17]. Thus, valuation of the appetitive/aversive nature of anticipated (or received) decision outcomes is a likely candidate for stress’ modulation. Indeed, stress-altered sensitivity to rewarding/punishing outcomes (e.g., primary, food; secondary, money) appears to play a role in development of some pathologies including binge eating [18], pathological gambling [

Stress and learning: the role of habit

A logical next question relates to how stress might influence expression of previously learned outcomes. Research across disciplines supports the idea that DM processes can be placed on a spectrum ranging from (I) habitual, stimulus-bound, automatic, and less effortful, to (II) goal-directed, flexible, controlled, more effortful and resource-dependent [39, 40, 41, 42]. As learning proceeds over time to establish strong and ingrained prior expectations informing DM, might stress exposure bias

Stress and risk-taking

Another prominent emphasis in stress-DM investigations is risk-taking, a critical issue given its prevalence in stressful real-life contexts including medicine [55], psychopathology [56], and financial investing [57]. Decision-makers’ likelihood to engage in risk varies greatly based on multiple decision-inherent features including uncertainty (i.e., degree of information informing outcome predictability [58]), framing of a decision (as a potential gain or loss [59]), and valuations of outcome

Future directions

Despite some lack of internal consistency given a wide range of between-study methodological differences, the human stress and DM literature has made great advances over the last few years. For instance, there are consistent observations indicating that stress exposure reduces reward valuation upon receipt of an outcome yet questions remain at anticipation due to differences in stress-to-task latency. A growing consensus supports a propensity to shift toward habit-based from goal-directed

Conflict of interest statement

Nothing declared.

References and recommended reading

Papers of particular interest, published within the period of review, have been highlighted as:

• of special interest
•• of outstanding interest

Acknowledgements

AJP was supported by funding from the Scientific Research Network for Decision Neuroscience and Aging (subaward under NIH Grant AG039350). MRD was supported by funding from the National Institute on Drug Abuse (DA027764).

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View full text

Stress and decision making: effects on valuation, learning, and risk-taking

Highlights

Section snippets

The stress construct

Stress and valuation: reward-related processing

Stress and learning: the role of habit

Stress and risk-taking

Future directions

Conflict of interest statement

References and recommended reading

Acknowledgements

Behav Brain Res

J Endocrinol

Psychol Bull

Nat Rev Neurosci

Annu Rev Clin Psychol

Psychol Med

Front Hum Neurosci

Front Neurosci

Soc Cogn Affect Neurosci

Behav Neurosci

Trends Cogn Sci

Trends Cogn Sci

Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A

Neuron

Homeost Health Dis

Annu Rev Psychol

Trends Cogn Sci

Front Neurosci

Eur J Neurosci

Psychol Rev

Neuron

J Exp Psychol Gen

Neuroeconomics: the consilience of brain and decision

Science

Stress and memory: behavioral effects and neurobiological mechanisms

Neural Plast

A syndrome produced by diverse nocuous agents

Nature

Neural regulation of endocrine and autonomic stress responses

Nat Rev Neurosci

Bodily Changes in Pain, Hunger, Fear, and Rage: An Account of Recent Researches into the Function of Emotional Excitement

Chronic stress causes frontostriatal reorganization and affects decision-making

Science

Physiology and neurobiology of stress and adaptation: central role of the brain

Physiol Rev

Effects of stress throughout the lifespan on the brain, behaviour and cognition

Nat Rev Neurosci

Stress and the adolescent brain: amygdala-prefrontal cortex circuitry and ventral striatum as developmental targets

Neurosci Biobehav Rev

Blocking mineralocorticoid receptors impairs, blocking glucocorticoid receptors enhances memory retrieval in humans

Neuropsychopharmacology

The coming out of the brain mineralocorticoid receptor

Trends Neurosci

Neurocircuitry of stress: central control of the hypothalamo-pituitary-adrenocortical axis

Trends Neurosci

The good, the bad and the brain: neural correlates of appetitive and aversive values underlying decision making

Curr Opin Behav Sci

Stress, eating and the reward system

Physiol Behav

Pathological gambling: a comprehensive review of biobehavioral findings

Neurosci Biobehav Rev

Acute stress reduces reward responsiveness: implications for depression

Biol Psychiatry

Acute stress and food-related reward activation in the brain during food choice during eating in the absence of hunger

Int J Obes

Stress-induced reduction in reward-related prefrontal cortex function

Neuroimage

Differential effects of acute stress on anticipatory and consummatory phases of reward processing

Neuroscience

Stress modulates reinforcement learning in younger and older adults

Psychol Aging

Risk and reward are processed differently in decisions made under stress

Curr Direct Psychol Sci

Differential effect of stress on in vivo dopamine release in striatum, nucleus accumbens, and medial frontal cortex

J Neurochem

Individual differences in stress-induced dopamine release in the nucleus accumbens are influenced by corticosterone

Eur J Neurosci