Behavioral functions of the mesolimbic dopaminergic system: an affective neuroethological perspective.

TL;DR: A comprehensive comparative analysis of the two neural circuits of social behavior network and mesolimbic reward system concludes that they were already present in early vertebrates and proposes that these circuits form a larger social decision‐making (SDM) network that regulates adaptive behavior.

TL;DR: The results demonstrate that reward has an impact on vision that is independent of its role in the strategic establishment of endogenous attention and suggests that reward plays an important and undervalued role in attentional control.

TL;DR: Since all vertebrates appear to have some capacity for primal affective feelings, the implications for animal-welfare and how the authors ethically treat other animals are vast.

TL;DR: The structure of opponency is considered in terms of previous biases about the nature of the decision problems that animals face, the conflicts that may arise between Pavlovian and instrumental responses, and an additional spectrum joining invigoration to inhibition to shed light on aspects of the role of serotonin and its interactions with dopamine.

TL;DR: These findings are particularly timely, as law‐ and policymakers are tasked to reverse the ongoing opioid epidemic, as more states legalize marijuana, as new products including electronic cigarettes and newly designed abused substances enter the legal and illegal markets, and as “deaths of despair” from alcohol and drug misuse continue.

TL;DR: The present study provides the first direct molecular genetics support for Gray's Reinforcement Sensitivity Theory (RST), which is one of the most influential biologically oriented personality theories.

TL;DR: It is shown that when averaging the non-stationary prediction errors across trials, a ramping in the activity of the dopamine neurons should be apparent, whose magnitude is dependent on the learning rate.

TL;DR: In contrast to early psychoanalytic theory, which stressed pleasurable/aggressive drives and the symbolic meaning of drugs to explain their appeal, a modern psychodynamic perspective of substance-use disorders (SUDs) places greater emphasis on intolerable painful or confusing affects that make addictive drugs compelling.