In novel situations, where direct experience is lacking or outdated, humans must rely on mental simulations to predict future outcomes. This review discusses recent work on the neural circuits that support such inference-based behavior. We focus on two specific examples: 1) using knowledge about the associative structure of the world to infer outcomes when direct experience is lacking; 2) inferring the current value of options when the desirability of the associated outcome has changed since the original learning experience. These two examples can be studied in the sensory preconditioning and devaluation tasks, respectively. We review results from studies in animals and humans suggesting that the orbitofrontal cortex (OFC), together with the hippocampus and amygdala, is necessary for inference in both of these tasks. Together, these findings suggest that the OFC is a critical hub in the brain network that supports inference-based decision-making.

中文翻译：

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用于基于推理的决策的神经电路。


在缺乏直接经验或直接经验已经过时的新情况下，人类必须依靠心理模拟来预测未来的结果。这篇综述讨论了支持这种基于推理的行为的神经回路的最新研究。我们关注两个具体例子：1）在缺乏直接经验的情况下，使用有关世界联想结构的知识来推断结果； 2）当相关结果的可取性自原始学习经历以来发生变化时，推断选项的当前价值。这两个例子可以分别在感觉预处理和贬值任务中进行研究。我们回顾了动物和人类研究的结果，表明眶额皮层 (OFC) 以及海马体和杏仁核对于这两项任务的推理是必要的。总之，这些发现表明 OFC 是大脑网络中支持基于推理的决策的关键枢纽。