Speaker
Steven Miletić
Bio
Dr. Steven Miletić obtained all his academic degrees (BSc, MSc, PhD) cum laude at the University of Amsterdam. Dr. Miletić did his PhD under supervision of Dr. Birte Forstmann, followed by one postdoc in her group, before becoming (tenured) assistant professor at Leiden University in 2023. Dr. Miletić’s research focuses on cognitive and neural modelling of decision and learning processes in humans, with emphasis on the human subcortex and on advanced methodology including hierarchical Bayesian approaches and ultra-high field fMRI.
Abstract
Decision making is often studied in highly controlled experimental paradigms where the environment is mostly stationary. This contrasts with the dynamic and non-stationary environments in which humans evolved, which necessitate continuous adaptation of behavior. My work proposes that adaptive mechanisms cause systematic fluctuations in choice performance across trials, both in non-stationary and in stationary choice environments. In this talk, I will present a set of experiments and formal models of choice behavior that integrate adaptive mechanisms. Through these, I will demonstrate that incorporating adaptive mechanisms in evidence-accumulation models is a promising way forward to understanding not only how choice behavior changes across time, but also why it changes.