A computational model for the effect of dopamine on action selection during stroop test

Abstract

Based on a connectionist model of cortex-basal ganglia-thalamus loop recently proposed by authors, a simple connectionist model realizing the Stroop effect is established. The connectionist model of cortex-basal gangliathalamus loop is a nonlinear dynamical system and the model is not only capable of revealing the action selection property of basal ganglia but also is capable of modelling the effect of dopamine on action selection. While the interpretation of action selection function is based on solutions of nonlinear dynamical system, the effect of dopamine is modelled by a parameter. The effect of dopamine in inhibiting the habitual behaviour corresponding to word reading in Stroop test and letting the novel one occur corresponding to colour naming is investigated using the model established in this work. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2006.