Goal-seeking compresses neural codes for space in the human hippocampus and orbitofrontal cortex

Paul S Muhle-Karbe*, Hannah Sheahan, Giovanni Pezzulo, Hugo J Spiers, Samson Chien, Nicolas W Schuck, Christopher Summerfield*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

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Abstract

Humans can navigate flexibly to meet their goals. Here, we asked how the neural representation of allocentric space is distorted by goal-directed behavior. Participants navigated an agent to two successive goal locations in a grid world environment comprising four interlinked rooms, with a contextual cue indicating the conditional dependence of one goal location on another. Examining the neural geometry by which room and context were encoded in fMRI signals, we found that map-like representations of the environment emerged in both hippocampus and neocortex. Cognitive maps in hippocampus and orbitofrontal cortices were compressed so that locations cued as goals were coded together in neural state space, and these distortions predicted successful learning. This effect was captured by a computational model in which current and prospective locations are jointly encoded in a place code, providing a theory of how goals warp the neural representation of space in macroscopic neural signals.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)3885-3899.e6
Number of pages21
JournalNeuron
Volume111
Issue number23
Early online date18 Sept 2023
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 6 Dec 2023

Bibliographical note

Copyright © 2023 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Inc.

Keywords

  • cognitive control
  • context-based decisions
  • Hippocampus
  • planning
  • representational geometry
  • spatial navigation
  • cognitive maps
  • Orbitofrontal cortex

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