Topic: shattering dimensionality analysis

Mounting evidence suggests that the prefrontal cortex encodes environmental uncertainty for value-based decision-making. However, how uncertainty influences goal-seeking at the neural level remains elusive. We used human fMRI data collected with a two-stage Markov decision task to investigate the neural embeddings of goal and uncertainty during reinforcement learning (RL). We found that the neural activity patterns of the lateral prefrontal cortex (LPFC) and orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) encode the immediate goals and the environmental uncertainty levels, compared with other brain areas involved