About his PhD project

In well-known/easy contexts, we quickly decide what the best action to execute is. In new or difficult situations, or following mistakes, we are cautious and take more time before acting. The understanding of the main constraints that influence the decision process and their neuronal underpinning is still fragmentary. The goal of this project is to combine behavioral science, engineering, and model-based data analysis to understand how rodents take decision in a whisker-guided choice task. The 1st objective will be to develop a decision making task in an ethologically valid environment allowing a 24x7 on-demand testing. In the 2nd objective, drift-diffusion modeling and reinforcement learning will be combined to characterize behavioral dynamics and generate prediction on decision making mechanisms.

Keywords: decision making, confidence, drift-diffusion model, whisker, cortex, basal ganglia, reinforcement learning theory