Associations between Electrophysiological Evidence of Reward and Punishment-Based Learning and Psychotic Experiences and Social Anhedonia in At-Risk Groups

Both positive psychotic symptoms and anhedonia are associated with striatal functioning, but few studies have linked risk for psychotic disorders to a neural measure evoked during a striatal dopamine-related reward and punishment-based learning task, such as a reversal learning task (RLT; Cools et al, 2009). The feedback-related negativity (FRN) is a neural response that in part reflects striatal dopamine functioning. We recorded EEG during the RLT in three groups: (a) people with psychotic experiences (PE; n=20) at increased risk for psychotic disorders; (b) people with extremely elevated social anhedonia (SocAnh; n=22); and (c) controls (n=20). Behaviorally, consistent with increased striatal dopamine, the PE group exhibited better behavioral learning (ie, faster responses) after unexpected reward than after unexpected punishment. Moreover, although the control and SocAnh groups showed a larger FRN to punishment than reward, the PE group showed similar FRNs to punishment and reward, with a numerically larger FRN to reward than punishment (with similar results on these trials also found for a P3a component). These results are among the first to link a neural response evoked by a reward and punishment-based learning task specifically with elevated psychosis risk.