ReviewPsychonomic bulletin & review2025
On the origin of the reward function: Exploring the role of conditioned reinforcement and social learning.
Review in Psychonomic bulletin & review, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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0 citing papers in PubMed.
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Authors and funding
1 author.
Funding
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Abstract
Influential cognitive science theories postulate that decision-making is based on treating expected outcomes as incentives according to a reward function. Yet a systematic analysis of the learning processes that determine the reward function remains to be carried out. The paper fills this gap by examining the contribution of two fundamental learning processes: conditioned reinforcement, occurring either via direct or via vicarious experience, and imitative incentive learning, at play when an agent appropriates the incentives sought by another individual. From an evolutionary perspective, the two processes appear to be adaptive insofar as conditioned reinforcement might have evolved to simplify decision-making, while imitative incentive learning might have arisen to harness the full potential of social learning and to facilitate cooperation. The paper contributes to research on decision-making by offering a detailed analysis of the learning mechanisms that drive acquisition of the reward function.
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What Socratic holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the Socratic graph.