They study the dynamics of the brain to create robotic applications capable of making decisions

A neuroscientific study analyzed how biological networks determine decision-making in order to develop tools and robotic applications capable of making decisions inspired by the dynamics of our brain.

Led by the Charité University of Berlin, in collaboration with the Brain and Cognition Center (CBC) of the Pompeu Fabra University (UPF) in Barcelona, ​​Spain, the main goal of the study was to create intelligent applications, not so much to determine the speed of thought in decision-making , the Spanish organization pointed out today.

UPF defended that the definition of models that describe the dynamics of the brain for intelligent decision-making it is an approach that can contribute to the creation of intelligent applications.

In a paper recently published in the journal Nature Communications, Gustavo Deco, a researcher at the Center for Brain and Cognition at the UPF, questions whether decision-making speed is associated with higher levels of intelligence.

“We believe that more biologically realistic models could outperform classical artificial intelligence in the future,” said Petra Ritter, who is the lead researcher of the study from Charité University in Berlin.

Regarding the speed of thought, Petra Ritter added that “if the brain has more time and considers more evidence, it invests more in solving problems and finds better solutions.”

They study 650 people

To carry out the study, scientists analyzed the brain dynamics of 650 people and conducted the same number of simulations with artificial neural networks.

Observations from brain simulations were compared with empirical data from 650 study participants who took the Penn Matrix Reasoning Test (PMAT), which consists of a series of increasingly difficult patterned questions.

The results of these tests made it possible to quantify the participants’ fluid intelligence (FI), a concept that refers to people’s ability to make difficult decisions when faced with new situations.

Both the results of the simulations, which occurred first, and the later study of brain dynamics with real people confirmed that the higher the fluid intelligence, the more time is invested in solving difficult tasks.

This means that people with higher fluid intelligence scores spent more time solving difficult tasks compared to those with lower fluid intelligence, since the former “were only faster when answering simple questions.”

“This is not so surprising, because if the brain has more time and considers more evidence, it invests more in solving problems and finds better solutions,” said Gustavo Deco.

global vision of the brain

In order to examine the dynamics of the brain in decision-making processes, this research took an innovative approach and instead of looking at how specific brain regions function when performing specific cognitive tasks, it looks at a global model of the whole brain.

According to Gustav Deco, the research “represents a radical change compared to previous research, in which brain dynamics have been shaped for specific tasks such as decision-making from mini-circuits in individual areas”, while the study postulated a paradigm shift implying that ” computation of cognitive tasks radically distributed throughout the brain”.

With this approach, it was possible to determine that a brain in which different parts of the brain are better synchronized is better at solving problems, but not necessarily faster, according to the study.