Finding patterns is a crucial component of human learning and decision-making. Researchers have now observed what occurs in people’s brains as they initially identify patterns in the information that is presented to them.
According to research, pattern learning is processed by the brain differently than probabilistic learning, another popular method of learning.
Participants in the study were shown 50 series of 12 photographs, sometimes in a pattern and sometimes in a random order, that contained different arrangements of the three shots of a hand, a face, and a landscape. When participants chose which photo they believed would appear next, an MRI machine inside of a lab monitored which regions of their brains were active.
Ian Krajbich, the co-author of the study and assistant professor of psychology and economics at The Ohio State University, said that the study allowed them to “identify what areas of the brain were activated when individuals recognized that there was a pattern — or realized that there was no pattern.
Together with Arkady Konovalov, a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Zurich who earned his at Ohio State, Krajbich conducted the study. The research is published in the journal Neuron.
According to Konovalov, humans constantly look for patterns in their surroundings because doing so facilitates learning. For instance, you could attempt to memorize each turn if you were given driving instructions in a strange city. However, it will be simpler to recall if you notice a pattern, such as turning left, then right, then left, then right.
We came to the conclusion that little was known about how people deduce these laws, according to Konovalov.
26 persons participated in the study. Every picture they saw started as a jumbled image that was gradually exposed over the course of three seconds.
As soon as they believed they understood which of the three photos was being shown, they pressed a button. The goal was to choose the image that was being displayed as rapidly as possible. The more quickly participants responded, the more money they won for each accurate response.
“They have to wait a while and it costs them money if they don’t know what image is coming next,” Krajbich added. But as soon as they recognized a pattern, they were able to respond quicker, and we were able to observe how this was mirrored in their brains.
A distinct type of learning model, known as a probabilistic model, has long been researched by scientists.
In the probabilistic model, people gain knowledge by calculating the likelihood that one event will follow another. For instance, you might discover that following a loss, your favorite sports team typically wins two out of three games.
Krajbich asserted the model does not adequately account for pattern learning. When you see patterns, you can predict when a given occurrence will take place.
According to Konovalov, participants in the study are learning patterns and formulating rules that help them make faster and more accurate decisions rather than simply guessing which photo will appear next.
The way the brain is involved in probabilistic and pattern learning is different, according to Krajbich.
Different brain regions were shown to be engaged in this study depending on the two types of uncertainty that the individuals experienced.
The uncertainty of the following image was one type of uncertainty. The results revealed, not unexpectedly, that the same brain regions involved in this task were also those that earlier research had identified to be involved in probabilistic learning, according to Krajbich.
The second type of ambiguity involved whether the displayed images had a pattern. The ventromedial prefrontal cortex, a separate region of the brain, was active when the subjects processed this question.
Other studies have demonstrated that this brain region is connected to reward.
We don’t know for sure now, but one interpretation is that people may be feeling rewarded for determining whether there is a trend or not, Krajbich said.
Another area of the brain that was particularly active when participants were recognizing patterns was the hippocampus. According to Krajbich, “we discovered that persons with higher hippocampus activity were faster learners.
Overall, the research demonstrated that pattern learning and probabilistic learning are processed in the brain in different ways.
Krajbich remarked, “The brain is keeping track of more things than we previously assumed.” It is about finding rules to help anticipate better and faster, not merely what will happen next.
