PhD Studentship: The Computational and Neural Dynamics of Human Motivation and Cognitive Control

Overview:

Using the tools of cognitive and computational neuroscience (fMRI/MEG/Computational Modelling and brain stimulation) to understand motivation, decision-making and cognitive control.

Project Outline:

To succeed at most of our daily goals involves engaging in behaviours that are highly physically or cognitively demanding. From a workout at the gym, studying for an exam, or working hard to impress your boss, being motivated to exert control over effortful acts is fundamental for success. Yet, a significant reduction in the willingness to exert effort, known as apathy, is highly common. It is one of the most prevalent symptoms across neurological and psychiatric disorders, and also impacts on education, employment and well-being in the typical population. However, the psychological, computational and neural mechanisms underlying motivation – and how they vary between people due to apathy – are poorly understood.

In particular, despite much research examining how motivated people are to exert effort overall, on average, this ignores how dynamic motivation can be. We know little about how the willingness to exert control changes from one moment to the next. How do we learn when to exert effort? How do we decide to exert effort to make progress for longer-term goals? Which brain mechanisms allow us to adapt our exertion of effort to make it appropriate to the location we are in? This project will build on new theories of how motivation can be highly dynamic and change from moment to moment to provide answers to such questions.

These novel theories have been developed in the Motivation and Social Neuroscience (MSN; www.msn-lab.com) lab of Prof. Matthew Apps and the Adaptive Control of Cognition and Behaviour lab of Dr. Romy Froemer to provide the answers to such questions. The student will get training from these supervisors, supported by members of their labs, in computational modelling, brain imaging (fMRI or MEG/EEG), machine learning techniques, and learn how to design experimental tasks that probe novel features of motivated behaviour with sophisticated experimental designs deployed online and in the lab.

Depending on the interests of the student, there may be the opportunity to use novel neuroscience tools including wearable MEG (OPMs), focused ultrasound brain stimulation, and get the opportunity to work with patient populations if desired. They will get the chance to learn approaches from reinforcement learning, theories of foraging behaviour, cost-benefit processing models and psychological theories of motivated behaviour. This will enable them to build new frameworks that fundamentally shift our understanding of motivation across health and disease.

The aim of the MSN lab is to understand the biological and psychological mechanisms of human motivation and is currently funded by over £3m of grants from the BBSRC, Wellcome Trust and European Research Council. The lab is situated in the Centre for Human Brain Health, in the University of Birmingham, which has world-class facilities including MRI, MEG, Optically pumped MEG, Focused Ultrasound Stimulation, Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation, Functional Near Infrared Spectroscopy, and EEG.

Supervision team: Professor Matthew Apps and Dr Romy Froemer.

Interested candidates are strongly encouraged to get in contact (m.a.j.apps@bham.ac.uk) with a copy of their CV, and to have an informal discussion about projects before submitting an application.

Funding Details

This is a 4-year BBSRC MIBTP PhD Studentship. This year only candidates classified as a "home" UK student for fees will be considered for this project.

Further Information: https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/cross_fac/mibtp/about_mibtp/

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