Decisions, decisions, decisions: the development and plasticity of reinforcement learning, social and temporal decision making in children

Human decision-making is the flexible way people respond to their environment, take actions, and plan toward long-term goals. It is commonly thought that humans rely on distinct decision-making systems, which are either more habitual and reflexive or deliberate and calculated. How we make decisions can provide insight into our social functioning, mental health and underlying psychopathology, and ability to consider the consequences of our actions. Notably, the ability to make appropriate, habitual or deliberate decisions depending on the context, here referred to as metacontrol, remains underexplored in developmental samples. This thesis aims to investigate the development of different decision-making mechanisms in middle childhood (ages 5-13) and to illuminate the potential neurocognitive mechanisms underlying value-based decision-making. Using a novel sequential decision-making task, the first experimental chapter presents robust markers of model-based decision-making in childhood (N = 85), which reflects the ability to plan through a sequential task structure, contrary to previous developmental studies. Using the same paradigm, in a new sample via both behavioral (N = 69) and MRI-based measures (N = 44), the second experimental chapter explores the neurocognitive mechanisms that may underlie model-based decision-making and its metacontrol in childhood and links individual differences in inhibition and cortical thickness to metacontrol. The third experimental chapter explores the potential plasticity of social and intertemporal decision-making in a longitudinal executive function training paradigm (N = 205) and initial relationships with executive functions. Finally, I critically discuss the results presented in this thesis and their implications and outline directions for future research in the neurocognitive underpinnings of decision-making during development