Avoiding Punishment Is Its Own Reward Date: July 10, 2006 ... During the experimental trials, participants selected one of two fractal images presented on a screen. After a fractal was chosen, ...

In subsequent trials they had to choose between sets of two images, one which offered no reward and one that incurred a $ ... [punishment avoidance] seems to be a reward,” says O’Doherty.

Compared with reward seeking, punishment avoidance learning is less clearly understood at both the computational and neurobiological levels. Here we demonstrate, using computational modelling and ...