Emotions and rewards are highly associated, both psychologically and neurally. My PhD aims to investigate why humans engage in successive reward behaviours, specifically why they often pursue and consume rewards (e.g., food) after having experience positive outcomes in other areas (e.g., achievements). The studies will build upon my previous Masters by Research (MRes) project which demonstrated, across two experiments, that momentary positive emotional episodes (as induced using positive feedback on a quiz task) substantially increased the consumption of rewarding but unhealthy snacks, as compared to brief negative or neutral affective states. My PhD project will investigate how these effects and successive reward-seeking behaviours more generally (e.g., celebrating after positive outcomes) can be explained.
A mixed-methods approach will comprise of controlled laboratory tasks, including a small exploratory fMRI paradigm and an ecological field experiment, followed by qualitative interviews aimed at helping to interpret the quantitative data. Together these studies will delineate the factors underlying successive reward engagement by contrasting the roles of (1) bottom-up, neural mechanisms, in which the pre-activation of the brain’s reward system primes subsequent reward-seeking, (2) top-down, cognitive-motivational processes, in which the achievement of the positive outcome is “self-rewarded” to consolidate the successful behaviours that led to the outcome and “self-licensing” where individuals seek rewards when they believe situational cues provide them with reasons to take part in usually forbidden behaviours.
My PhD will offer a novel insight into a uniquely human behaviour – seeking rewards following positive events – but also advance our understanding of everyday behaviours, such as snacking, that are often associated with negative health consequences.
