Duke Institute for Brain Sciences

Research in my laboratory focuses on understanding the brain mechanisms underlying executive control, with particular emphasis on systems responsible for economic and social decision making. We use functional magnetic resonance imaging to probe changes in brain activation associated with decision making, integrating fMRI activation measures with behavioral and psychometric data. Because economic and social decisions are common in many game settings, many of our experiments use paradigms adapted from gambling, such as poker or slot machines. An underlying neural theme throughout our work is to understand the functions supported by prefrontal cortex: in what ways do different prefrontal regions contribute to an individual decision? Ongoing studies evaluate whether there are distinct forms of uncertainty whose resolution is mediated by different brain systems; how certainty, risk, and ambiguity differentially influence decision processes; and how changes in the probability of events influence brain systems for decision making. Collectively, these studies fall under the emerging field of "neuroeconomics."

Ph.D., Duke University, 1999

B.A., University of Texas at Austin, 1994

Clithero JA, Reeck C, Carter RM, Smith DV, Huettel SA (2011). Nucleus accumbens mediates relative motivation for rewards in the absence of choice. Front Hum Neurosci. 2011;5:87.

Ballard IC, Murty VP, Carter RM, MacInnes JJ, Huettel SA, Adcock RA (2011). Dorsolateral prefrontal cortex drives mesolimbic dopaminergic regions to initiate motivated behavior. J Neurosci. 31(28):10340-10346.

Coutlee CG, Huettel SA (2011). The functional neuroanatomy of decision making: Prefrontal control of thought and action. Brain Res. 2011 May 30. [Epub ahead of print].

Clithero, J.A., Tankersley, D., & Huettel, S.A. (2008). Foundations of Neuroeconomics: From Philosophy to Practice. Public Library of Science: Biology, 6 (11): e298.