# Healthy Aging and the Cost of Cognitive Effort

> **NIH NIH R21** · WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY · 2021 · $196,875

## Abstract

Project Summary (Abstract)
This proposal explores the neural and psychological mechanisms that underlie older adult decision-making,
particularly decisions about whether or not to engage in cognitively effortful activities. Basic research in the
cognitive neuroscience of aging has suggested that older adults show declines in the ability to control thoughts
and actions based on internal goals, and that this may stem from age-related changes in the functioning of the
prefrontal cortex and mid-brain dopamine system. Yet older adults also seem to experience clear shifts in
motivational prioritization, although currently the relationship between motivation, cognition function, and
decision-making is poorly understood. The current proposal provides a novel perspective on this issue, by
focusing on interactions between motivation and cognitive control through the conceptual lens of
neuroeconomic decision-making. Specifically, we build upon a recent theoretical framework, value-based
cognitive control (VBCC), which postulates that motivational value serves to counteract the subjective and
computational costs of engaging in cognitive control. A key implication of the VBCC framework is that age-
related motivational reprioritization may shift cost-benefit computations, leading towards increased subjective
costs associated with engagement in cognitively effortful activities. The project directly tests this hypothesis,
utilizing an innovative neuroeconomic decision-making paradigm known as the COG-ED (Cognitive Effort
Discounting), which provides the means to quantitatively estimate the subjective cost of cognitive effort. We
utilize the COG-ED to examine the neural mechanisms associated with potentially increased cognitive effort
costs in older adults, using state-of-the-art neuroimaging methods. Specifically, we employ simultaneous
PET/fMRI scanning to both monitor effort-related activity in brain regions associated with encoding of
subjective motivational value, while at the same time directly assessing dopamine function in these regions.
We further test the domain-generality of our theoretical framework, utilizing the COG-ED and a within-subjects
neuroimaging design to test for increased cognitive effort costs among older adults in both working memory
and speech comprehension. We rigorously explore the ecological validity of the VBCC framework, by
repeatedly sampling older adult daily-life experiences and motivations towards cognitively effortful activities with
a naturalistic, ecological momentary assessment (EMA) approach. This project component enables a strong
test of cross-level bridging hypotheses, such as whether age-related declines in brain valuation mechanisms
contribute to increased cognitive effort costs and reduced engagement in daily-life effortful activities among older
adults. The findings of this project have high

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10142340
- **Project number:** 5R21AG067295-02
- **Recipient organization:** WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY
- **Principal Investigator:** TODD S BRAVER
- **Activity code:** R21 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2021
- **Award amount:** $196,875
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2020-04-15 → 2023-03-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10142340

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10142340, Healthy Aging and the Cost of Cognitive Effort (5R21AG067295-02). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-22 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10142340. Licensed CC0.

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