Adaptive learning requires distinguishing volatility, changes in the latent state of the environment, from moment-to-moment stochasticity of observations. The two demand opposite adjustments to the learning rate: volatility calls for faster updating, stochasticity for slower. Disentangling them is computationally difficult because both inflate experienced variance, leaving the inference prone to systematic individual differences with potential consequences for psychopathology. Three computational phenotypes capture this variation: intact learners; stochasticity-blind learners, who over-update by treating noise as change; and volatility-blind learners, who under-update by treating change as noise. In two large online samples and across three tasks, we found a double dissociation between these phenotypes and transdiagnostic psychiatric dimensions: stochasticity-blind learners scored higher on Internalizing (anxiety, depression), volatility-blind learners on Externalizing (behavioral addiction, compulsivity). Distinct symptom dimensions thus correspond to distinct failures of inference about uncertainty, supporting a selective rather than generalized account of learning-under-uncertainty deficits in psychopathology.
Fang, X., Piray, P.
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