TY  - JOUR
A1  - Eder, Andreas B.
A1  - Dignath, David
T1  - Expected value of control and the motivational control of habitual action
JF  - Frontiers in Psychology
N2  - A hallmark of habitual actions is that, once they are established, they become insensitive to changes in the values of action outcomes. In this article, we review empirical research that examined effects of posttraining changes in outcome values in outcome-selective Pavlovian-to-instrumental transfer (PIT) tasks. This review suggests that cue-instigated action tendencies in these tasks are not affected by weak and/or incomplete revaluation procedures (e.g., selective satiety) and substantially disrupted by a strong and complete devaluation of reinforcers. In a second part, we discuss two alternative models of a motivational control of habitual action: a default-interventionist framework and expected value of control theory. It is argued that the default-interventionist framework cannot solve the problem of an infinite regress (i.e., what controls the controller?). In contrast, expected value of control can explain control of habitual actions with local computations and feedback loops without (implicit) references to control homunculi. It is argued that insensitivity to changes in action outcomes is not an intrinsic design feature of habits but, rather, a function of the cognitive system that controls habitual action tendencies.
KW  - habit
KW  - outcome devaluation
KW  - Pavlovian-to-instrumental transfer
KW  - default-interventionist framework
KW  - expected value of control
KW  - cognitive control
Y1  - 2019
U6  - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-195703
SN  - 1664-1078
VL  - 10
IS  - 1812
ER  -