"Sometimes the hardest part of doing an unpleasant task is simply getting started - typing the first word of a long report, lifting the dirty dish atop an overfilled sink, or removing the clothes from an unused exercise machine. The obstacle isn't necessarily a lack of interest in completing the task, but the brain's resistance to taking the first step."
"Now, scientists may have identified the neural circuit behind this resistance, and a way to ease it. In a study published today in Cell Reports, researchers describe a pathway in the brain that appears to act as a 'motivation brake', dampening the drive to begin a task. When the team selectively suppressed this circuit in macaque monkeys, goal-directed behavior rebounded."
"Previous work on task initiation has implicated a neural circuit connecting two parts of the brain known as the ventral striatum and ventral pallidum, both of which are involved in processing motivation and reward,,. But attempts to isolate the circuit's role have fallen short. Electrical stimulation, for example, inadvertently activates downstream regions, affecting motivation, but also anxiety. In the new study, Amemori and his team used a more precise approach. They first trained two male macaque monkeys to perform two decision-making tasks. In one,"
A pathway in the brain acts as a 'motivation brake' that reduces the drive to initiate tasks. Selective suppression of that circuit in macaque monkeys restored goal-directed behavior dramatically. The motivation brake can be particularly persistent in conditions such as schizophrenia and major depressive disorder and is distinct from task avoidance driven by risk aversion in anxiety disorders. Electrical stimulation of the circuit can confound results by activating downstream regions that influence anxiety. A more precise, targeted approach was used to train and test macaques on decision-making tasks to isolate the circuit's role in initiation.
Read at Nature
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