Project description
Identifying brain processes during naturalistic decision-making
For many years, the reductionist approach dominated research on how the brain makes decisions, but it was limited in its ability to provide insight into the prefrontal cortex’s role in decision-making, planning and motivation. Funded by the European Research Council, the FORAGINGCORTEX project aims to fill this gap by taking a multidisciplinary approach that links cognitive decision processes with sequential and self-determined behaviours. Drawing on insights from ecology, biology, psychology and neuroscience, the project will seek to identify and classify key components of complex, intelligent and adaptive behaviour. The ultimate goal is to build a computational model that can simulate these processes so that we can understand behaviour in more realistic and holistic environments than traditional reductionist approaches allow.
Objective
Being able to make adaptive decisions and follow through is crucial for animals and humans alike. While some simplifications of real life environments are necessary for laboratory settings, past studies have often removed essential complexity. Specifically, a common reductionist approach toward decision making focuses exclusively on a neuro-economic framing. However, this neglects that in the real world, behaviour is often a sequence of choices, requiring planning and sustained motivation to reach our goals. Only by examining cognition and behaviour embedded in these sequences can we gain a full understanding of prefrontal cortex function in general and its cognitive, computational and neural role in sequential behaviours in particular. To answer this challenge, over the last couple of years, I have been at the forefront of developing a new neuro-ethological approach enabled by advances in computational modeling, experimental designs, brain recording annd stimulation techniques. In the proposal, I have identified key cognitive processes linked to challenges the prefrontal cortex has evolved to solve. For prefrontal cortex, this means sequential and selfdetermined behaviours. To make the complexity tractable, I take inspiration from multiple disciplines including ecology, biology, psychology and neuroscience. This way, I can identify the essential elements for achieving adaptive complex behaviour as a response to real-life challenges and build unifying computational models around those processes.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
This project's classification has been validated by the project's team.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
This project's classification has been validated by the project's team.
Keywords
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
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HORIZON.1.1 - European Research Council (ERC)
MAIN PROGRAMME
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Topic(s)
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Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Funding Scheme
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
HORIZON-ERC - HORIZON ERC Grants
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Call for proposal
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
(opens in new window) ERC-2022-STG
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Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.
75654 PARIS
France
The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.