Brain-behaviour relationships in the perceptual decision-making process through cognitive processing stages

Abstract

Perceptual decision making, as a process of detecting and categorizing information, has been studied extensively over the last two decades. In this study, we investigated the neural characterization of the whole decision-making process by discovering the information processing stages. Such that, the timing and the neural signature of the processing stages were identified for individual trials. The association of stages duration with the stimulus coherency and spatial prioritization factors also revealed the importance of the evidence accumulation process on the speed of the whole decision-making process. We reported that the impact of the stimulus coherency and spatial prioritization on the neural representation of the decision-making process was consistent with the behavioral characterization as well. This study demonstrated that uncovering the cognitive processing stages provided more insights into the decision-making process.