The Neural Correlates of Ambiguity and Risk in Human Decision-Making under an Active Inference Framework

Abstract

Active inference integrates perception, decision-making, and learning into a united theoretical frame-work, providing an efficient way to trade off exploration and exploitation by minimizing (expected) free energy. In this study, we asked how the brain represents values and uncertainties (ambiguity and risk), and resolves these uncertainties under the active inference framework in the exploration-exploitation trade-off. 25 participants performed a contextual two-armed bandit task, with electroencephalogram (EEG) recordings. By comparing the model evidence for active inference and reinforcement learning models of choice behavior, we show that active inference better explains human decision-making under ambiguity and risk, which entails exploration or information seeking. The EEG sensor-level results show that the activity in the frontal, central, and parietal regions is associated with ambiguity, while activity in the frontal and central brain regions is associated with risk. The EEG source-level results indicate that the expected free energy is encoded in the frontal pole and middle frontal gyrus and uncertainties are encoded in different brain regions but with overlap. Our study dissociates the expected free energy and uncertainties in active inference theory and their neural correlates, speaking to the construct validity of active inference in characterizing cognitive processes of human decisions. It provides behavioral and neural evidence of active inference in decision processes and insights into the neural mechanism of human decision under ambiguity and risk.