Longitudinal link between trait motivation and risk-taking behaviors via neural risk processing ; Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience

Prior research has emphasized the importance of the motivational system in risky decision-making, yet the mechanisms through which individual differences in motivation may influence adolescents' risk-taking behaviors remain to be determined. Based on developmental neuroscience literature illustrating the importance of risk processing in explaining individual differences in value-based decision making, we examined risk processing as a potential mediator of the association between trait motivations and adolescents' risk-taking behaviors. The sample consisted of 167 adolescents (47% females) annually assessed for three years (13-14 years of age at Time 1). Approach and avoidance motivations were measured using adolescent self-report. Risk preference was estimated based on adolescents' decisions during a modified economic lottery choice task with neural risk processing being measured by blood-oxygen-level-dependent responses in the bilateral insular cortex for chosen options. Adolescents' risk-taking behaviors were assessed by laboratory-based risky decision making using the Stoplight task. Longitudinal mediation analyses revealed a significant indirect effect of approach motivation, such that higher motivation was correlated with increases in risk-taking behaviors via decreases in neural activation in the bilateral insular cortex during risk processing. The findings illustrate a neural pathway through which approach motivation is translated into the vulnerability to risk taking development. ; National Institute on Drug AbuseUnited States Department of Health & Human ServicesNational Institutes of Health (NIH) - USANIH National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) [R01 DA036017, F31 DA042594] ; This work was supported by grants from the National Institute on Drug Abuse (R01 DA036017 to Jungmeen Kim-Spoon and Brooks King-Casas and F31 DA042594 to Nina Lauharatanahirun). We thank current and former JK Lifespan Development lab members for their help with data collection. We are grateful to the adolescents and parents who ...