Response outcome gates the effect of spontaneous cortical state fluctuations on perceptual decisions

Sensory responses of cortical neurons are more discriminable when evoked on a baseline of desynchronized spontaneous activity, but cortical desynchronization has not generally been associated with more accurate perceptual decisions. Here, we show that mice perform more accurate auditory judgments wh...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:eLife 2023-05, Vol.12
Main Authors: Reato, Davide, Steinfeld, Raphael, Tacão-Monteiro, André, Renart, Alfonso
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Accuracy
Animals
arousal
auditory cortex
Auditory Cortex - physiology
Auditory discrimination
Behavior
Brain
brain state
Cortex (auditory)
Cortex (somatosensory)
Cortical Synchronization
decision making
Mice
mouse
Movement
Neurons - physiology
Neuroscience
performance monitoring
Recording sessions
Sensory neurons
Synchronization
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Summary:Sensory responses of cortical neurons are more discriminable when evoked on a baseline of desynchronized spontaneous activity, but cortical desynchronization has not generally been associated with more accurate perceptual decisions. Here, we show that mice perform more accurate auditory judgments when activity in the auditory cortex is elevated and desynchronized before stimulus onset, but only if the previous trial was an error, and that this relationship is occluded if previous outcome is ignored. We confirmed that the outcome-dependent effect of brain state on performance is neither due to idiosyncratic associations between the slow components of either signal, nor to the existence of specific cortical states evident only after errors. Instead, errors appear to gate the effect of cortical state fluctuations on discrimination accuracy. Neither facial movements nor pupil size during the baseline were associated with accuracy, but they were predictive of measures of responsivity, such as the probability of not responding to the stimulus or of responding prematurely. These results suggest that the functional role of cortical state on behavior is dynamic and constantly regulated by performance monitoring systems.
ISSN:2050-084X
2050-084X
DOI:10.7554/eLife.81774