Research
We study how individuals process and adapt to positive and negative emotional events in their daily life and how such events shape their decisions and well-being.
Below are examples of topics that we explore.
How does the human brain know the value of items or actions and how do we use this information to guide behaviors? Collectively, our studies have built on elegant animal models to highlight the role of the human striatum in reward processing. Given its heterogeneity in terms of functionality and connectivity with cortical regions and midbrain dopaminergic centers, we have observed that the striatum is critically involved in learning about rewards, processing positive and negative outcomes and guiding future choices (e.g., Delgado et al., 2000; Delgado, 2007; Dickerson et al., 2011; Smith et al., 2016; Wang et al., 2016).
How do we evaluate rewards and make decisions when they involve other people? How do we integrate information regarding known facts, social influences and personal experience to arrive at a choice? Trusting someone during a business exchange, for example, is not only about the value of a potential reward (i.e., its financial benefit), but also about fostering interpersonal relationships, and can be influenced by our prior knowledge about someone (e.g., Delgado et al., 2005). Social rewards, from receiving a “like” on social media to positive encouragement from a friend (e.g. Smith et al., 2015), are some of the most sought after rewards which help nurture social connection within our social networks (e.g., Fareri et al., 2012; 2015), and influence reward-related brain circuitry (e.g., Bhanji & Delgado, 2014). Taken together, our studies aim to examine the influence of social context on reward processing and decision making, while also exploring the benefits of social rewards to well-being.
What is the impact of negative information on behavior? How do we learn and make decisions under stress? Besides reward-related processes, research in the lab also investigates the influence of negative affect in the human brain and associated behavior. These studies serve as a precursor to understanding how humans learn to cope with potential negative outcomes that can sway decision-making in maladaptive ways (e.g., drug use to alleviate negative affect). Our research examines how the presence of negative reinforcers (e.g., monetary loss) or negative context (e.g., stress) is processed by the human brain to alter decision making during both basic (e.g., avoidance learning; Delgado et al. 2009; Lewis et al., 2013) and more complex situations such as persisting with goals (e.g., Bhanji & Delgado, 2014), and at times under pre-existing negative conditions such as a stressful state (e.g., Porcelli and Delgado, 2017), induced by social evaluation, exposure to physical stimuli, environmental circumstances and even pressure to attain a reward (e.g., Watanabe et al., 2019).
How do we control our emotions? Individuals can at times overweigh the value they assign to rewards (e.g., winning money) or aversive (e.g., losing money) stimuli, leading to maladaptive behaviors (e.g., risk-seeking or avoidance). Emotion regulation strategies can be useful in controlling the emotional reaction to a salient stimulus that can have downstream effects on decision-making. We have observed that the use of cognitive strategies recruits prefrontal cortical regions and effectively decreases subjective, physiological and neural correlates of both appetitive (e.g., Delgado et al., 2008) and aversive processing (e.g., Schiller & Delgado, 2010). Further, we have shown that successful emotion regulation can have a positive influence on decision-making (e.g., attenuated risk-seeking behavior; e.g., Martin-Braunstein et al, 2014).
How do positive emotions influence our decisions and affect our well-being? We have posited that an individual’s perception of control and ability to sustain positive emotions via memory recall may carry value to individuals and is linked with emotion regulation and well-being. For instance, we have shown that the opportunity to exert control (i.e., make a choice) is valuable and preferred to not having a choice (e.g., Leotti et al., 2011; Wang et al., 2019), and that an increased perception of control can help individuals cope with negative outcomes and persist with their goals (e.g., Bhanji et al., 2016). Further, we have observed that increasing positive emotions via the recall of positive autobiographical memories correlates with reward-related neural activity, increases subjective positive feelings and mood and helps cope with acute stress (e.g., Speer et al, 2014; Speer & Delgado, 2017).
Applications to Society and Health
An extension of our work is to translate our understanding of basic science to the domain of social issues, health and clinical implications. We primarily accomplish these goals through collaborations with experts in the field and have explored questions related to reward processing, perception of control and emotion regulation in the context of addiction (e.g., Manglani et al., 2017; Konova et al., 2017) and mental health (Romaniuk et al., 2019) for example.