| Article ID | Journal | Published Year | Pages | File Type |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 4320689 | Neuron | 2016 | 13 Pages |
•In free-viewing monkeys, orbitofrontal neurons signal the distance of gaze from a cue•The distance signal is nearly as strong as the signal representing cue value•In some cells, value signals increase when subjects fixate on the cue•Representation of gaze distance persists across two distinct task phases
SummaryIn the natural world, monkeys and humans judge the economic value of numerous competing stimuli by moving their gaze from one object to another, in a rapid series of eye movements. This suggests that the primate brain processes value serially, and that value-coding neurons may be modulated by changes in gaze. To test this hypothesis, we presented monkeys with value-associated visual cues and took the unusual step of allowing unrestricted free viewing while we recorded neurons in the orbitofrontal cortex (OFC). By leveraging natural gaze patterns, we found that a large proportion of OFC cells encode gaze location and, that in some cells, value coding is amplified when subjects fixate near the cue. These findings provide the first cellular-level mechanism for previously documented behavioral effects of gaze on valuation and suggest a major role for gaze in neural mechanisms of valuation and decision-making under ecologically realistic conditions.
