Impaired Punishment Learning in Conduct Disorder - 26/03/24
Abstract |
Objective |
Conduct disorder (CD) has been associated with deficits in the use of punishment to guide reinforcement learning (RL) and decision making. This may explain the poorly planned and often impulsive antisocial and aggressive behavior in affected youths. Here, we used a computational modeling approach to examine differences in RL abilities between CD youths and typically developing controls (TDCs). Specifically, we tested 2 competing hypotheses that RL deficits in CD reflect either reward dominance (also known as reward hypersensitivity) or punishment insensitivity (also known as punishment hyposensitivity).
Method |
The study included 92 CD youths and 130 TDCs (aged 9-18 years, 48% girls) who completed a probabilistic RL task with reward, punishment, and neutral contingencies. Using computational modeling, we investigated the extent to which the 2 groups differed in their learning abilities to obtain reward and/or to avoid punishment.
Results |
RL model comparisons showed that a model with separate learning rates per contingency explained behavioral performance best. Importantly, CD youths showed lower learning rates than TDCs specifically for punishment, whereas learning rates for reward and neutral contingencies did not differ. Moreover, callous-unemotional (CU) traits did not correlate with learning rates in CD.
Conclusion |
CD youths have a highly selective impairment in probabilistic punishment learning, regardless of their CU traits, whereas reward learning appears to be intact. In summary, our data suggest punishment insensitivity rather than reward dominance in CD. Clinically, the use of punishment-based intervention techniques to achieve effective discipline in patients with CD may be a less helpful strategy than reward-based techniques.
Le texte complet de cet article est disponible en PDF.Key words : conduct disorder, decision making, punishment, reinforcement, computational modeling
Plan
This study was funded by the European Commission's Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007-2013) under Grant Agreement no.602407 (FemNAT-CD, coordinator: Christine M. Freitag). |
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The research was performed with permission from Aachen: Ethics committee of the medical faculty at RWTH Aachen University EK027/14 and Southampton: The University of Southampton Research Governance Office (RGO) and Insurance Services (UK) ID: 8215. |
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Consent has been provided for descriptions of specific patient information. |
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Author Contributions Conceptualization: Fairchild, Lockwood, Kohls Formal analysis: Elster, Lockwood Funding acquisition: Freitag Investigation: Brazil Methodology: Elster, Pauli, Baumann, Lockwood Project administration: De Brito, Fairchild, Freitag, Konrad, Kohls Resources: Freitag, Konrad, Roessner Supervision: Pauli, Roessner, Kohls Validation: Pauli Visualization: Elster Writing – original draft: Elster, Kohls Writing – review and editing: Elster, Pauli, Baumann, De Brito, Fairchild, Freitag, Konrad, Roessner, Brazil, Lockwood, Kohls |
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Disclosure: Dr. Freitag has received royalties for books on attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder and autism spectrum disorder. She has served as consultant to Desitin and Roche. Drs. Pauli, De Brito, and Fairchild, Profs. Konrad, Roessner, and Brazil, Drs. Lockwood and Kohls, Mr. Elster, and Ms. Baumann have reported no biomedical financial interests or potential conflicts of interest. |
Vol 63 - N° 4
P. 454-463 - avril 2024 Retour au numéroBienvenue sur EM-consulte, la référence des professionnels de santé.
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