Actions, action sequences and habits: evidence that goal-directed and habitual action control are hierarchically organized.

ABSTRACT: Behavioral evidence suggests that instrumental conditioning is governed by two forms of action control: a goal-directed and a habit learning process. Model-based reinforcement learning (RL) has been argued to underlie the goal-directed process; however, the way in which it interacts with habits and the structure of the habitual process has remained unclear. According to a flat architecture, the habitual process corresponds to model-free RL, and its interaction with the goal-directed process is coordinated by an external arbitration mechanism. Alternatively, the interaction between these systems has recently been argued to be hierarchical, such that the formation of action sequences underlies habit learning and a goal-directed process selects between goal-directed actions and habitual seque

SUBMITTER: Dezfouli A 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3854489 | biostudies-literature | 2013

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature