Anterior cingulate cortex monitors action state and action content in complex associative learning.

Overview

1. Department of Neurobiology and Anatomy, Drexel University College of Medicine Philadelphia United States
2. School of Arts and Sciences, University of Pennsylvania Philadelphia United States

Abstract

Environmental changes necessitate adaptive responses, and thus the ability to monitor one’s actions and their connection to specific cues and outcomes is crucial for survival. The anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) is implicated in these processes, yet its precise role in action monitoring vs. outcome tracking remains unclear. To investigate this, we developed a novel discrimination–avoidance task for mice, designed with clear temporal separation between actions and outcomes. Our findings show that ACC neurons primarily encode post-action variables over extended periods, reflecting the animal’s preceding actions rather than the outcomes or values of those actions. Specifically, we identified two distinct subpopulations of ACC neurons: one encoding the action state (whether an action was taken) and the other encoding the action content (which action was taken). Importantly, increased post-action ACC activity was associated with better performance in subsequent trials. These findings suggest that the ACC supports complex associative learning through extended signaling of rich action-relevant information, thereby bridging cue, action, and outcome associations.

Reproduced under the paper's license (CC BY), from the paper cited above.

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The paper's code and data availability statement is in the Data section.

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Data

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Data availability

Data and code are publicly available at: https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.32591976.

The following dataset was generated:

HuangW HallAF KawalecN OpalkaAN LiuJ WangDV 2026Anterior cingulate cortex in complex associative learningfigshare10.6084/m9.figshare.32591976PMC1335429342429368

Reproduced under the paper's license (CC BY), from the paper cited above.

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Version 1, 27 September 2026: the first record

Recorded: type, language, journal, volume, pages, dates, 6 authors, 7 keywords, 9 MeSH terms, 1 funder, 69 references.

Cite

This paper

Huang, W., Hall, A. F., Kawalec, N., Opalka, A. N., Liu, J., & Wang, D. V. (2026). Anterior cingulate cortex monitors action state and action content in complex associative learning. eLife, 14, RP105774. https://doi.org/10.7554/elife.105774

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