year: 2019
paper: https://link.springer.com/article/10.3758/s13414-019-01760-1
website:
code:
connections: exploration vs exploitation, evolution
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Cisek 2019 has traced the evolution of perception, cognition, and action circuits from the Metazoan to the modern age. The circuits for reward exploitation and observation-driven exploration appear to have evolved separately, and act competitively, exactly the model we suggest. In particular he notes that exploration circuits in early animals were closely tied to the primary sense organs (i.e. information) and had no input from the homeostatic circuits.
This neural separation for independent circuits has been observed in some animals, including zebrafish and monkeys.