Question

Some psychologists hypothesize that lying causes a reduction in the reward associated with taking an action. People who are more “lie averse” face larger reductions in reward than those who are less lie averse. Suppose that you have access to a population of patients who have lesions in areas of the brain thought to be associated with the decision to lie (and a control group). You have an economic tax evasion task where, in each trial of the experiment people earn money. They are then are asked to report their earnings. Any reported earnings are taxed (see the incentive to lie?)

What is the advantage to collecting neural data in addition to behavioral data (or is there one)?

If there is an advantage of neural data, which measurement technique would you use. What area of the brain would you select as a region of interest (ROI). Explain. (Hint: neural data is often expensive to collect. Researchers don’t do it “just to see what happens.”)

Suppose that you want to study learning in 10 year olds playing a three-deck version of the Iowa Gambling Task. The experimental task itself will take about an hour. Behavioral pre-tests show that 10 year olds can understand the task. The two technologies you have available are fMRI and EEG. Briefly discuss the procedure for collecting data using each method and the advantages of limitations of each technology for the specific question of interest. Which would you choose for this subject population? Explain.