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An impressive array of neural processing appears to be dedicated to the extraction of reward-related information from environmental stimuli and use of this information in the generation of goal-directed behaviors. While other structures are certainly involved in these processes, the characteristics of activations seen in mesencephalic dopamine neurons, striatal neurons and neurons of the orbitofrontal cortex provide distinct examples of the different ways in which reward-related information is processed. In addition, the differences in activations seen in these three regions demonstrate the different roles they may play in goal-directed behavior.

A principal role played by dopamine neurons is that of a detector of an error in reward prediction. The homogeneity of responsiveness across the population of dopamine neurons indicates that this error signal is widely broadcast to dopamine terminal regions where it could …