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Grant support

We thank H. Diaz, M. Alvarez and A. Zainos for tech-nical assistance. This work was supported by Grants PGC2018-101992-B-I00 from the Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities (to S.S., M.B., J.F.-R., and N.P.) , PAPIIT-IN210819 and PAPIIT-IN205022 from the Direccion de Asuntos del Personal Academico de la Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico (to R.R.-P.) and CONACYT-319347 from Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnologia (to R.R.-P.) .

Analysis of institutional authors

Sarno SCorresponding AuthorParga NCorresponding Author

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January 20, 2022
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Article
Hybrid Gold

Dopamine firing plays a dual role in coding reward prediction errors and signaling motivation in a working memory task

Publicated to:Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. 119 (2): e2113311119- - 2022-01-11 119(2), DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2113311119

Authors: Sarno, Stefania; Beiran, Manuel; Falco-Roget, Joan; Diaz-deLeon, Gabriel; Rossi-Pool, Roman; Romo, Ranulfo; Parga, Nestor

Affiliations

Aix Marseille Univ, Inst Rech Phenomenes Hors Equilibres IRPHE, CNRS, UMR 7342, F-13013 Marseille, France - Author
Aix Marseille Univ, Turing Ctr Living Syst, Inst Neurobiol Mediterranee INMED, CNRS,INSERM,UMR S901, F-13009 Marseille, France - Author
Aix-Marseille Université, CNRS, INSERM, Institut de Neurobiologie de la Méditerranée (INMED, UMR S901), Turing Centre for Living Systems, 13009 Marseille, France. - Author
Aix-Marseille Université, CNRS, Institut de Recherche sur les Phénomènes Hors Équilibres (IRPHE, UMR 7342), 13013 Marseille, France. - Author
Centro de Ciencias de la Complejidad, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, 04510 Ciudad de México, México. - Author
Centro de Investigación Avanzada en Física Fundamental, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, 28049 Madrid, Spain. - Author
Colegio Nacl, Mexico City 06020, DF, Mexico - Author
Departamento de Física Teórica, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, 28049 Madrid, Spain - Author
Departamento de Física Teórica, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, 28049 Madrid, Spain. - Author
El Colegio Nacional, 06020 México DF, México. - Author
Instituto de Fisiología Celular, Departamento de Neurociencia Cognitiva, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, 04510 México City, México - Author
Instituto de Fisiología Celular, Departamento de Neurociencia Cognitiva, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, 04510 México City, México. - Author
Laboratoire de Neurosciences Cognitives Computationnelles, École Normale Supérieure - Paris Sciences et Lettres University, INSERM U960, 75005 Paris, France. - Author
Paris Sci & Lettres Univ, Lab Neurosci Cognit Computationnelles, INSERM U960, Ecole Normale Super, F-75005 Paris, France - Author
Univ Autonoma Madrid, Ctr Invest Avanzada Fis Fundamental, Madrid 28049, Spain - Author
Univ Autonoma Madrid, Dept Fis Teor, Madrid 28049, Spain - Author
Univ Nacl Autonoma Mexico, Ctr Ciencias Complejidad, Ciudad De Mexico 04510, Mexico - Author
Univ Nacl Autonoma Mexico, Inst Fisiol Celular, Dept Neurociencia Cognit, Mexico City 04510, DF, Mexico - Author
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Abstract

Little is known about how dopamine (DA) neuron firing rates behave in cognitively demanding decision-making tasks. Here, we investigated midbrain DA activity in monkeys performing a discrimination task in which the animal had to use working memory (WM) to report which of two sequentially applied vibrotactile stimuli had the higher frequency. We found that perception was altered by an internal bias, likely generated by deterioration of the representation of the first frequency during the WM period. This bias greatly controlled the DA phasic response during the two stimulation periods, confirming that DA reward prediction errors reflected stimulus perception. In contrast, tonic dopamine activity during WM was not affected by the bias and did not encode the stored frequency. More interestingly, both delay-period activity and phasic responses before the second stimulus negatively correlated with reaction times of the animals after the trial start cue and thus represented motivated behavior on a trial-by-trial basis. During WM, this motivation signal underwent a ramp-like increase. At the same time, motivation positively correlated with accuracy, especially in difficult trials, probably by decreasing the effect of the bias. Overall, our results indicate that DA activity, in addition to encoding reward prediction errors, could at the same time be involved in motivation and WM. In particular, the ramping activity during the delay period suggests a possible DA role in stabilizing sustained cortical activity, hypothetically by increasing the gain communicated to prefrontal neurons in a motivation-dependent way.Copyright © 2022 the Author(s). Published by PNAS.

Keywords

cortexdecisioninternal biasmotivationramping darepresentationsresponsesuncertaintyworking memoryDopamine activityInternal biasMotivationNeuronsRamping daWorking memory

Quality index

Bibliometric impact. Analysis of the contribution and dissemination channel

The work has been published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America due to its progression and the good impact it has achieved in recent years, according to the agency WoS (JCR), it has become a reference in its field. In the year of publication of the work, 2022, it was in position 8/73, thus managing to position itself as a Q1 (Primer Cuartil), in the category Multidisciplinary Sciences. Notably, the journal is positioned above the 90th percentile.

From a relative perspective, and based on the normalized impact indicator calculated from World Citations provided by WoS (ESI, Clarivate), it yields a value for the citation normalization relative to the expected citation rate of: 1.03. This indicates that, compared to works in the same discipline and in the same year of publication, it ranks as a work cited above average. (source consulted: ESI Nov 14, 2024)

This information is reinforced by other indicators of the same type, which, although dynamic over time and dependent on the set of average global citations at the time of their calculation, consistently position the work at some point among the top 50% most cited in its field:

  • Field Citation Ratio (FCR) from Dimensions: 4.82 (source consulted: Dimensions Aug 2025)

Specifically, and according to different indexing agencies, this work has accumulated citations as of 2025-08-03, the following number of citations:

  • WoS: 6
  • Scopus: 6

Impact and social visibility

From the perspective of influence or social adoption, and based on metrics associated with mentions and interactions provided by agencies specializing in calculating the so-called "Alternative or Social Metrics," we can highlight as of 2025-08-03:

  • The use, from an academic perspective evidenced by the Altmetric agency indicator referring to aggregations made by the personal bibliographic manager Mendeley, gives us a total of: 65.
  • The use of this contribution in bookmarks, code forks, additions to favorite lists for recurrent reading, as well as general views, indicates that someone is using the publication as a basis for their current work. This may be a notable indicator of future more formal and academic citations. This claim is supported by the result of the "Capture" indicator, which yields a total of: 63 (PlumX).

With a more dissemination-oriented intent and targeting more general audiences, we can observe other more global scores such as:

  • The Total Score from Altmetric: 16.5.
  • The number of mentions on the social network X (formerly Twitter): 5 (Altmetric).
  • The number of mentions in news outlets: 2 (Altmetric).

It is essential to present evidence supporting full alignment with institutional principles and guidelines on Open Science and the Conservation and Dissemination of Intellectual Heritage. A clear example of this is:

  • The work has been submitted to a journal whose editorial policy allows open Open Access publication.

Leadership analysis of institutional authors

This work has been carried out with international collaboration, specifically with researchers from: France; Mexico.

There is a significant leadership presence as some of the institution’s authors appear as the first or last signer, detailed as follows: First Author (SARNO --, STEFANIA) and Last Author (PARGA CARBALLEDA, NESTOR).

the authors responsible for correspondence tasks have been SARNO --, STEFANIA and PARGA CARBALLEDA, NESTOR.