Arousal state affects perceptual decision-making by modulating hierarchical sensory processing in a large-scale visual system model.

ABSTRACT: Arousal levels strongly affect task performance. Yet, what arousal level is optimal for a task depends on its difficulty. Easy task performance peaks at higher arousal levels, whereas performance on difficult tasks displays an inverted U-shape relationship with arousal, peaking at medium arousal levels, an observation first made by Yerkes and Dodson in 1908. It is commonly proposed that the noradrenergic locus coeruleus system regulates these effects on performance through a widespread release of noradrenaline resulting in changes of cortical gain. This account, however, does not explain why performance decays with high arousal levels only in difficult, but not in simple tasks. Here, we present a mechanistic model that revisits the Yerkes-Dodson effect from a sensory perspective: a deep co

SUBMITTER: Sorensen LKA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9009767 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature