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Selected Publications
These publications are foundational to our current projects
Transcriptomic diversity of amygdalar subdivisions across humans and nonhuman primates. Totty MS, Cervera-Juanes R, Bach SV, Ben Ameur L, Valentine MR, Simons E, Romac MD, Trinh H, Henderson K, Del Rosario I, Tippani M, Miller RA, Kleinman JE, Cerceo Page S, Saunders A, Hyde TM, Martinowich K, Hicks SC, Costa VD. (2024) bioRxiv, doi: 10.1101/2024.10.18.618721. PMID: 39463931
Transcriptomic landscape of mammalian ventral pallidum at single-cell resolution. Yang L, Fang LZ, Lynch MR, Xu CS, Hahm H, Zhang Y, Heitmeier MR, Costa VD, Samineni VK, & Creed M. (2024) bioRxiv, doi: 10.1101/2024.05.24.595793. PMID: 38826431
The neurocomputational bases of explore-exploit decision-making. Hogeveen J, Mullins TS, Romero JD, Eversole E, Rogge-Obando K, Mayer AR, Costa VD. (2022) Neuron, 110, 1869-1879.e5. doi: 10.1016/j.neuron.2022.03.014. PMID: 35390278
Balancing exploration and exploitation with information and randomization. Wilson RC, Bonawitz E, Costa VD, Ebitz RB. (2021) Current Opinion in Behavioral Sciences, 38:49-56, doi: 10.1016/j.cobeha.2020.10.001. PMID: 33184605
Primate orbitofrontal cortex codes information relevant for managing explore-exploit tradeoffs. Costa VD, Averbeck BB. (2020) Journal of Neuroscience, 40, 2553-2561. doi: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.2355-19.2020. PMID: 32060169.
Subcortical substrates of explore-exploit decisions in primates. Costa VD, Mitz AR, Averbeck BB. (2019) Neuron, 103, 533-545.e5. doi: 10.1016/j.neuron.2019.05.017. PMID: 31196672.
Ventral striatum's role in learning from gains and losses. Taswell CA, Costa VD, Murray EA, Averbeck BB. (2018) Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA, 115, E12398-E12406. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1809833115. PMID: 30545910.
Motivational neural circuits underlying reinforcement learning. Averbeck BA and Costa VD. (2017) Nature Neuroscience, 20, 505-512. doi: 10.1038/nn.4506. PMID: 28352111.
Amygdala and ventral striatum make distinct contributions to reinforcement learning. Costa VD, Dal Monte O, Lucas DR, Murray EA, Averbeck BB. (2016) Neuron, 92, 505- 517. doi: 10.1016/j.neuron.2016.09.025. PMID: 27720488
Reversal learning and dopamine: a bayesian perspective. Costa VD, Tran VL, Turchi J, Averbeck BB. (2015) Journal of Neuroscience, 35, 2407-16. doi: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.1989-14.2015. PMID: 25673835.
Dopamine modulates novelty seeking behavior during decision making. Costa VD, Tran VL, Turchi J, Averbeck BB. (2014) Behavioral Neuroscience, 128, 556-66. doi: 10.1037/a0037128. PMID: 24911320.
Explore-Exploit Decision Making
Neural bases for deciding when to explore novel opporunities or exploit what was already learned
Electrophysiological Markers of Aberrant Cue-Specific Exploration in Hazardous Drinkers. Campbell EM, Singh G, Claus ED, Witkiewitz K, Costa VD, Hogeveen J, Cavanagh JF. (2023) Computational Psychiatry, 7, 47-59. doi: 10.5334/cpsy.96. PMID: 38774639.
What does the frontopolar cortex contribute to goal-directed cognition and action? Hogeveen J, Medalla M, Ainsworth M, Galeazzi J, Hanlon C, Mansouri F, Costa VD. (2022) Journal of Neuroscience, 42, 8508-8513.
Differential coding of goals and actions in ventral and dorsal corticostriatal circuits during goal-directed behavior. Tang H, Costa VD, Bartolo R, Averbeck BB. (2022) Cell Reports, 38, 110198. doi: 10.1016/j.celrep.2021.110198. PMID: 34986350.
The neurocomputational bases of explore-exploit decision-making. Hogeveen J, Mullins TS, Romero JD, Eversole E, Rogge-Obando K, Mayer AR, Costa VD. (2022) Neuron, 110, 1869-1879.e5. doi: 10.1016/j.neuron.2022.03.014. PMID: 35390278
Balancing exploration and exploitation with information and randomization. Wilson RC, Bonawitz E, Costa VD, Ebitz RB. (2021) Current Opinion in Behavioral Sciences, 38:49-56, doi: 10.1016/j.cobeha.2020.10.001. PMID: 33184605
Primate orbitofrontal cortex codes information relevant for managing explore-exploit tradeoffs. Costa VD, Averbeck BB. (2020) Journal of Neuroscience, 40, 2553-2561. doi: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.2355-19.2020. PMID: 32060169.
Subcortical substrates of explore-exploit decisions in primates. Costa VD, Mitz AR, Averbeck BB. (2019) Neuron, 103, 533-545.e5. doi: 10.1016/j.neuron.2019.05.017. PMID: 31196672.
Amygdala Contributions to Decision Making
The amygdala helps resolve uncertainty to facilitate decision making
Contribution of amygdala to dynamic model arbitration under uncertainty. Woo JH, Costa VD, Taswell CA, Rothenhoefer KM, Averbeck BB, Soltani A. (2024) bioRxiv, 2024, doi: 10.1101/2024.09.13.612869. PMID:39314420
Motor system-dependent effects of amygdala and ventral striatum lesions on explore-exploit behaviors. Giarrocco F, Costa VD, Basile BM, Pujara MS, Murray EA, Averbeck BB. (2024) Journal of Neuroscience, 44, e1206232023. doi: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.1206-23.2023. PMID: 38296647.
The amygdala is not necessary for the familiarity aspect of recognition memory. Basile BM, Costa VD, Schafroth JL, Karaskiewicz CL, Lucas DR, Murray EA. (2023) Nature Communications, 14, 8109. doi: 10.1038/s41467-023-43906-8. PMID: 38062014.
Differential coding of goals and actions in ventral and dorsal corticostriatal circuits during goal-directed behavior. Tang H, Costa VD, Bartolo R, Averbeck BB. (2022) Cell Reports, 38, 110198. doi: 10.1016/j.celrep.2021.110198. PMID: 34986350.
Effects of Amygdala Lesions on Object-Based Versus Action-Based Learning in Macaques. Taswell CA, Costa VD, Basile BM, Pujara MS, Jones B, Manem N, Murray EA, Averbeck BB. (2021) Cerebral Cortex, 31, 529-546. doi: 10.1093/cercor/bhaa241. PMID: 32954409.
Subcortical substrates of explore-exploit decisions in primates. Costa VD, Mitz AR, Averbeck BB. (2019) Neuron, 103, 533-545.e5. doi: 10.1016/j.neuron.2019.05.017. PMID: 31196672.
Amygdala and ventral striatum make distinct contributions to reinforcement learning. Costa VD, Dal Monte O, Lucas DR, Murray EA, Averbeck BB. (2016) Neuron, 92, 505- 517. doi: 10.1016/j.neuron.2016.09.025. PMID: 27720488
The role of frontal cortical and medial temporal lobe brain areas in learning a Bayesian prior belief on reversals. Jang AI, Costa VD, Rudebeck PH, Chudasama Y, Murray EA, Averbeck BB. (2015) The Role of Frontal Cortical and Medial-Temporal Lobe Brain Areas in Learning a Bayesian Prior Belief on Reversals. Journal of Neuroscience., 35, 11751-60. doi:
Cross-Species Collaborations
We believe in studying reinforcement learning mechanisms across species
Lesions to the mediodorsal thalamus, but not orbitofrontal cortex, enhance volatility beliefs linked to paranoia. Suthaharan P, Thompson SL, Rossi-Goldthorpe RA, Rudebeck PH, Walton ME, Chakraborty S, Noonan MP, Costa VD, Murray EA, Mathys CD, Groman SM, Mitchell AS, Taylor JR, Corlett PR, Chang SWC. Cell Reports, 43,114355. doi: 10.1016/j.celrep.2024.114355. PMID: 38870010.
The neurocomputational bases of explore-exploit decision-making. Hogeveen J, Mullins TS, Romero JD, Eversole E, Rogge-Obando K, Mayer AR, Costa VD. (2022) Neuron, 110, 1869-1879.e5. doi: 10.1016/j.neuron.2022.03.014. PMID: 35390278
Adolescent dopamine neurons represent reward differently during aaction and state guided learning. McCane AM, Wegener MA, Faraji M, Rivera-Garcia MT, Wallin-Miller KG, Costa VD, Moghaddam B. (2021) Journal of Neuroscience. 41, 9419-9430. doi: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.1321-21.2021. PMID: 34611024.
Entropy-based metrics for predicting choice behavior based on local response to reward. Trepka E, Spitmaan M, Bari BA, Costa VD, Cohen JY, Soltani A. (2021) Nature Communications, 12, 6567. doi: 10.1038/s41467-021-26784-w. PMID: 34772943.
Prefrontal regulation of punished ethanol self-administration. Halladay LR, Kocharian A, Piantadosi PT, Authement ME, Lieberman AG, Spitz NA, Coden K, Glover LR, Costa VD, Alvarez VA, Holmes A. (2020) Biological Psychiatry, 87, 967-978. doi: 10.1016/j.biopsych.2019.10.030. PMID: 31937415.
Cross-species convergence in pupillary response: understanding human anxiety via non-human primate amygdala lesion. Pagliaccio D, Pine DS, Leibenluft E, Dal Monte O, Averbeck BB, Costa VD. (2019) Social Cognitive Affective Neuroscience, 14, 591-599. doi: 10.1093/scan/nsz041. PMID: 31184751.
Neuromodulation of Decision Making
Effects of dopamine and serotonin on novelty seeking, reversal learning, and perceptual decision making
Blocking serotonin but not dopamine reuptake alters neural processing during perceptual decision making. Costa VD, Kakalios LC, Averbeck BB. (2016) Behavioral Neuroscience, 130, 461-8. doi: 10.1037/bne0000162. PMID: 27513807
Reversal learning and dopamine: a bayesian perspective. Costa VD, Tran VL, Turchi J, Averbeck BB. (2015) Journal of Neuroscience, 35, 2407-16. doi: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.1989- 14.2015. PMID: 25673835.
Dopamine modulates novelty seeking behavior during decision making. Costa VD, Tran VL, Turchi J, Averbeck BB. (2014) Behavioral Neuroscience, 128, 556-66. doi: 10.1037/a0037128. PMID: 24911320.
Human Learning and Decision Making
We examine information sampling and reinforcement learning in humans using the same tasks we study in nonhuman primates
Electrophysiological Markers of Aberrant Cue-Specific Exploration in Hazardous Drinkers. Campbell EM, Singh G, Claus ED, Witkiewitz K, Costa VD, Hogeveen J, Cavanagh JF. (2023) Computational Psychiatry, 7, 47-59. doi: 10.5334/cpsy.96. PMID: 38774639.
Deliberative Choice Strategies in Youths: Relevance to Transdiagnostic Anxiety Symptoms. Cardinale, EM, Pagliaccio D, Swetlitz C, Grassie H, Abend R, Costa VD, Averbeck B, Brotman MA, Pine DS, Leibenluft E, & Kircanski K. (2021) Clinical Psychological Science, 9, 979-989. https://doi.org/10.1177/2167702621991805
Frontal-parietal and limbic-striatal activity underlies information sampling in the best choice problem. Costa VD, Averbeck BB. (2015) Cerebral Cortex, 25, 972-82. doi: 10.1093/cercor/bht286. PMID: 24142842.
Instructed Fear Conditioning
Psychophysiological and neural correlates of using verbal instructions to form fearful associations
Aversive perception in a threat context: separate and independent neural activation. Sambuco N, Costa VD, Lang PJ, Bradley MM. (2020) Biological Psychology, 154, 107926. doi: 10.1016/j.biopsycho.2020.107926. PMID: 32621851.
Assessing the role of the amygdala in fear of pain: neural activation under threat of shock. Sambuco N, Costa VD, Lang PJ, Bradley MM. (2020) Journal of Affective Disorders, 276, 1142-1148. doi: 10.1016/j.jad.2020.07.110. PMID: 32791350.
From threat to safety: instructed reversal of defensive reactions. Costa VD, Bradley MM, Lang PJ. (2015) Psychophysiology, 52, 325-32. doi: 10.1111/psyp.12359. PMID: 25250656.
Threat of suffocation and defensive reflex activation. Lang PJ, Wangelin BC, Bradley MM, Versace F, Davenport PW, Costa VD. (2011) Psychophysiology, 48, 393-6. doi: 10.1111/j.1469-8986.2010.01076.x. PMID: 20667037.
Motivated Attention, Perception, and Imagery
Neural circuits prioritize encoding of affective stimuli
Directional interconnectivity of the human amygdala, fusiform gyrus, and orbitofrontal cortex in emotional scene perception. Frank DW, Costa VD, Averbeck BB, Sabatinelli D. (2019) Journal of Neurophysiology, 122, 1530-1537. doi: 10.1152/jn.00780.2018. PMID: 31166811.
Learned value shapes responses to objects infrontal and ventral stream networks in macaque monkeys. Kaskan PM, Costa VD, Eaton HP, Zemskova JA, Mitz AR, Leopold DA, Ungerleider LG, Murray EA. (2017) Cerebral Cortex, 27, 2739-2757. doi: 10.1093/cercor/bhw113. PMID: 27166166.
Imaging distributed and massed repetitions of natural scenes: spontaneous retrieval and maintenance. Bradley MM, Costa VD, Ferrari V, Codispoti M, Fitzsimmons JR, Lang PJ. (2015) Human Brain Mapping, 36, 1381-92. doi: 10.1002/hbm.22708. PMID: 25504854.
Selective looking at natural scenes: hedonic content and gender. Bradley MM, Costa VD, Lang PJ. (2015) International Journal of Psychophysiology, 98, 54-8. doi: 10.1016/j.ijpsycho.2015.06.008. PMID: 26156939
Amygdala lesions in rhesus macaques decrease attention to threat. Dal Monte O, Costa VD, Noble PL, Murray EA, Averbeck BB. (2015) Nature Communications, 6, 10161. doi: 10.1038/ncomms10161. PMID: 26658670.
Oxytocin enhances attention to the eye region in rhesus monkeys. Dal Monte O, Noble PL, Costa VD, Averbeck BB. (2014) Frontiers in Neuroscience, 8, 41. doi: 10.3389/fnins.2014.00041. PMID: 24624055.
Tagging cortical networks in emotion: a topographical analysis. Keil A, Costa VD, Smith JC, Sabatinelli D, McGinnis EM, Bradley MM, Lang PJ. (2012) Human Brain Mapping, 33, 2920-31. doi: 10.1002/hbm.21413. PMID: 21954087.
Do brain responses to emotional images and cigarette cues differ? An fMRI study in smokers. Versace F, Engelmann JM, Jackson EF, Costa VD, Robinson JD, Lam CY, Minnix JA, Brown VL, Wetter DW, Cinciripini PM. (2011) European Journal of Neuroscience, 34, 2054-63. doi: 10.1111/j.1460-9568.2011.07915.x. PMID: 22097928.
Scan patterns when viewing natural scenes: emotion, complexity, and repetition. Bradley MM, Houbova P, Miccoli L, Costa VD, Lang PJ. (2011) Psychophysiology, 48, 1544-1553. doi: 10.1111/j.1469-8986.2011.01223.x. PMID: 21649664
Emotional imagery: assessing pleasure and arousal in the brain's reward circuitry. Costa VD, Lang PJ, Sabatinelli D, Versace F, Bradley MM. (2010) Human Brain Mapping, 31, 1446- 57. doi: 10.1002/hbm.20948. PMID: 20127869.
The timing of emotional discrimination in human amygdala and ventral visual cortex. Sabatinelli D, Lang PJ, Bradley MM, Costa VD, Keil A. (2009) Journal of Neuroscience., 29, 14864-8. doi: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.3278-09.2009. PMID: 19940182.
Pleasure rather than salience activates human nucleus accumbens and medial prefrontal cortex. Sabatinelli D, Bradley MM, Lang PJ, Costa VD, Versace F. (2007) Journal of Neurophysiology, 98, 1374-9. doi: 10.1152/jn.00230.2007. PMID: 17596422.
Where do we publish our science?
Number of Costa lab publications (articles, commentaries, reviews) in unique journals (2007-2024).
Team members are encouraged to publish regularly in a diverse set of journals to increase the likelihood of scientific success (Acuna et al. 2012)