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In Search of the Neural Circuits of Intrinsic Motivation

Children seem to acquire new know-how in a continuous and open-ended manner. In this paper, we hypothesize that an intrinsic motivation to progress in learning is at the origins of the remarkable structure of children's developmental trajectories. In this view, children engage in exploratory an...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Kaplan, Frederic, Oudeyer, Pierre-Yves
Formato: Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Frontiers Research Foundation 2007
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2518057/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18982131
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/neuro.01.1.1.017.2007
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author Kaplan, Frederic
Oudeyer, Pierre-Yves
author_facet Kaplan, Frederic
Oudeyer, Pierre-Yves
author_sort Kaplan, Frederic
collection PubMed
description Children seem to acquire new know-how in a continuous and open-ended manner. In this paper, we hypothesize that an intrinsic motivation to progress in learning is at the origins of the remarkable structure of children's developmental trajectories. In this view, children engage in exploratory and playful activities for their own sake, not as steps toward other extrinsic goals. The central hypothesis of this paper is that intrinsically motivating activities correspond to expected decrease in prediction error. This motivation system pushes the infant to avoid both predictable and unpredictable situations in order to focus on the ones that are expected to maximize progress in learning. Based on a computational model and a series of robotic experiments, we show how this principle can lead to organized sequences of behavior of increasing complexity characteristic of several behavioral and developmental patterns observed in humans. We then discuss the putative circuitry underlying such an intrinsic motivation system in the brain and formulate two novel hypotheses. The first one is that tonic dopamine acts as a learning progress signal. The second is that this progress signal is directly computed through a hierarchy of microcortical circuits that act both as prediction and metaprediction systems.
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spelling pubmed-25180572008-11-03 In Search of the Neural Circuits of Intrinsic Motivation Kaplan, Frederic Oudeyer, Pierre-Yves Front Neurosci Neuroscience Children seem to acquire new know-how in a continuous and open-ended manner. In this paper, we hypothesize that an intrinsic motivation to progress in learning is at the origins of the remarkable structure of children's developmental trajectories. In this view, children engage in exploratory and playful activities for their own sake, not as steps toward other extrinsic goals. The central hypothesis of this paper is that intrinsically motivating activities correspond to expected decrease in prediction error. This motivation system pushes the infant to avoid both predictable and unpredictable situations in order to focus on the ones that are expected to maximize progress in learning. Based on a computational model and a series of robotic experiments, we show how this principle can lead to organized sequences of behavior of increasing complexity characteristic of several behavioral and developmental patterns observed in humans. We then discuss the putative circuitry underlying such an intrinsic motivation system in the brain and formulate two novel hypotheses. The first one is that tonic dopamine acts as a learning progress signal. The second is that this progress signal is directly computed through a hierarchy of microcortical circuits that act both as prediction and metaprediction systems. Frontiers Research Foundation 2007-10-15 /pmc/articles/PMC2518057/ /pubmed/18982131 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/neuro.01.1.1.017.2007 Text en Copyright: © 2007 Kaplan and Oudeyer. http://www.frontiersin.org/licenseagreement This is an open-access article subject to an exclusive license agreement between the authors and the Frontiers Research Foundation, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original authors and source are credited.
spellingShingle Neuroscience
Kaplan, Frederic
Oudeyer, Pierre-Yves
In Search of the Neural Circuits of Intrinsic Motivation
title In Search of the Neural Circuits of Intrinsic Motivation
title_full In Search of the Neural Circuits of Intrinsic Motivation
title_fullStr In Search of the Neural Circuits of Intrinsic Motivation
title_full_unstemmed In Search of the Neural Circuits of Intrinsic Motivation
title_short In Search of the Neural Circuits of Intrinsic Motivation
title_sort in search of the neural circuits of intrinsic motivation
topic Neuroscience
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2518057/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18982131
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/neuro.01.1.1.017.2007
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