Motivational salience is a
cognitive process and a form of
attention
Attention is the behavioral and cognitive process of selectively concentrating on a discrete aspect of information, whether considered subjective or objective, while ignoring other perceivable information. William James (1890) wrote that "Att ...
that ''motivates'' or propels an individual's behavior towards or away from a particular
object, perceived event or outcome.
Motivational salience regulates the intensity of behaviors that facilitate the attainment of a particular
goal, the amount of time and energy that an individual is willing to expend to attain a particular goal, and the
amount of risk that an individual is willing to accept while working to attain a particular goal.
Motivational salience is composed of two component processes that are defined by their attractive or aversive effects on an individual's behavior relative to a particular stimulus: ''incentive salience'' and ''aversive salience''.
Incentive salience is the attractive form of motivational salience that causes approach behavior, and is associated with
operant reinforcement
In behavioral psychology, reinforcement is a consequence applied that will strengthen an organism's future behavior whenever that behavior is preceded by a specific antecedent stimulus. This strengthening effect may be measured as a higher freq ...
,
desirable outcomes, and pleasurable stimuli.
[ Aversive salience is the aversive form of motivational salience that causes avoidance behavior, and is associated with operant punishment, undesirable outcomes, and unpleasant stimuli.]
Incentive salience
Incentive salience is a cognitive process that confers a " desire" or "want" attribute, which includes a motivational component, to a rewarding stimulus. ''Reward'' is the attractive and motivational property of a stimulus that induces appetitive behavior – also known as approach behavior – and consummatory behavior. The "wanting" of incentive salience differs from "liking" in the sense that liking is the pleasure that is immediately gained from the acquisition or consumption of a rewarding stimulus; the "wanting" of incentive salience serves a "motivational magnet" quality of a rewarding stimulus that makes it a desirable and attractive goal, transforming it from a mere sensory experience into something that commands attention, induces approach, and causes it to be sought out.
Incentive salience is regulated by a number of brain structures, but it is assigned to stimuli by a region of the ventral striatum known as the nucleus accumbens shell
The nucleus accumbens (NAc or NAcc; also known as the accumbens nucleus, or formerly as the ''nucleus accumbens septi'', Latin for "nucleus adjacent to the septum") is a region in the basal forebrain rostral to the preoptic area of the hypo ...
. Incentive salience is primarily regulated by dopamine
Dopamine (DA, a contraction of 3,4-dihydroxyphenethylamine) is a neuromodulatory molecule that plays several important roles in cells. It is an organic chemical of the catecholamine and phenethylamine families. Dopamine constitutes about 80% o ...
neurotransmission in the mesocorticolimbic projection
Dopaminergic pathways (dopamine pathways, dopaminergic projections) in the human brain are involved in both physiological and behavioral processes including movement, cognition, executive functions, reward, motivation, and neuroendocrine control. ...
, but activity in other dopaminergic pathways and hedonic hotspots (e.g., the ventral pallidum) also modulate incentive salience.
Clinical significance
Addiction
The assignment of incentive salience to stimuli is dysregulated in addiction
Addiction is a neuropsychological disorder characterized by a persistent and intense urge to engage in certain behaviors, one of which is the usage of a drug, despite substantial harm and other negative consequences. Repetitive drug use o ...
. Addictive drugs are intrinsically rewarding (not to be confused with pleasure) and therefore function as primary positive reinforcers of continued drug use that are assigned incentive salience. During the development of an addiction, the repeated association of otherwise neutral and even non-rewarding stimuli with drug consumption triggers an associative learning process that causes these previously neutral stimuli to act as conditioned positive reinforcers of addictive drug use (i.e., these stimuli start to function as drug cues). As conditioned positive reinforcers of drug use, these previously neutral stimuli are assigned incentive salience (which manifests as a craving) – sometimes at pathologically high levels due to reward sensitization – which can transfer to the primary reinforcer (e.g., the use of an addictive drug) with which it was originally paired. Thus, if an individual remains abstinent from drug use for some time and encounters one of these drug cues, a craving for the associated drug may reappear. For example, anti-drug agencies previously used posters with images of drug paraphernalia
"Drug paraphernalia" is a term to denote any equipment, product or accessory that is intended or modified for making, using or concealing drugs, typically for recreational purposes. Drugs such as marijuana, cocaine, heroin, and methampheta ...
as an attempt to show the dangers of drug use. However, such posters are no longer used because of the effects of incentive salience in causing relapse upon sight of the stimuli illustrated in the posters.
In addiction
Addiction is a neuropsychological disorder characterized by a persistent and intense urge to engage in certain behaviors, one of which is the usage of a drug, despite substantial harm and other negative consequences. Repetitive drug use o ...
, the "liking" (pleasure or hedonic value) of a drug or other stimulus becomes dissociated from "wanting" (i.e., desire or craving) due to the sensitization of incentive salience.[Berridge, K.C., Robinson, T.E. What is the role of dopamine in reward: hedonic impact, reward learning, or incentive salience? Brain Res Brain Res Rev. 1998 Dec; 28(3):309–69.] In fact, if the incentive salience associated with drug-taking becomes pathologically amplified, the user may want the drug more and more while liking it less and less as tolerance
Tolerance or toleration is the state of tolerating, or putting up with, conditionally.
Economics, business, and politics
* Toleration Party, a historic political party active in Connecticut
* Tolerant Systems, the former name of Veritas Software ...
develops to the drug's pleasurable effects.
Neuropsychopharmacology
Dopaminergic psychostimulants
Amphetamine improves task saliency (motivation to perform a task) and increases arousal
Arousal is the physiological and psychological state of being awoken or of sense organs stimulated to a point of perception. It involves activation of the ascending reticular activating system (ARAS) in the brain, which mediates wakefulness, th ...
(wakefulness), in turn promoting goal-directed behavior. The reinforcing and motivational salience-promoting effects of amphetamine are mostly due to enhanced dopaminergic activity in the mesolimbic pathway
The mesolimbic pathway, sometimes referred to as the reward pathway, is a dopaminergic pathway in the brain. The pathway connects the ventral tegmental area in the midbrain to the ventral striatum of the basal ganglia in the forebrain. The ven ...
.
See also
Notes
References
{{Addiction, state=expanded
Addiction
Amphetamine
Attention
Behaviorism
Behavior modification
Cognition
Cognitive psychology
Motivation
Neuropsychology