Old dogs can’t be bothered to learn new tricks: Our motivation to engage declines with age as brain circuit that weighs up pros and cons slows down

Motivation to learn new things and engage with life declines with age due to falling activity in a brain circuit that weighs costs and benefits, a study on mice suggested. US experts have been studying ‘striosomes’ — clusters of cells in the basal ganglia, a brain area linked to habit formation, movement control, emotion and addiction. They team found that striosomes are key to the decision making process when dealing with ‘approach-avoidance conflict’ — when a choice has both pros and cons. For example, one such thorny problem might be whether or not to take a new job that pays better, but would also call for a move away from family and friends. Working with mice, the researchers found that striosomal activity is correlated to the evaluation of costs and benefits — but that this activity diminishes with age. In a similar fashion, older mice were seen to be less motivated to engage with the experiment that forced them to deal with approach-avoidance conflict. However, the team found that they could increase or decrease the motivation of mice in the decision-making activity by boosting or suppressing striosome activity. In 2017, the same team found — also in rodent models — that… Read full this story

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