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Abstract
Behavioral choices that ignore prior experience promote exploration and unpredictability
but are seemingly at odds with the brain's tendency to use experience to optimize
behavioral choice. Indeed, when faced with virtual competitors, primates resort to
strategic counter prediction rather than to stochastic choice. Here, we show that
rats also use history- and model-based strategies when faced with similar competitors
but can switch to a "stochastic" mode when challenged with a competitor that they
cannot defeat by counter prediction. In this mode, outcomes associated with an animal's
actions are ignored, and normal engagement of anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) is suppressed.
Using circuit perturbations in transgenic rats, we demonstrate that switching between
strategic and stochastic behavioral modes is controlled by locus coeruleus input into
ACC. Our findings suggest that, under conditions of uncertainty about environmental
rules, changes in noradrenergic input alter ACC output and prevent erroneous beliefs
from guiding decisions, thus enabling behavioral variation. PAPERCLIP: