Cortico-striatal activity characterizes human safety learning via Pavlovian conditioned inhibition

Abstract

Safety learning generates associative links between neutral stimuli and the absence of threat, promoting the inhibition of fear and security-seeking behaviours. Precisely how safety learning is mediated at the level of underlying brain systems, particularly in humans, remains unclear. Here, we integrated a novel Pavlovian conditioned inhibition task with ultra-high field (UHF) fMRI to examine the neural basis of inhibitory safety learning in 49 healthy participants. In our task, participants were conditioned to two safety signals: a conditioned inhibitor that predicted threat-omission when paired with a known threat signal (A+/AX-), and a standard safety signal that generally predicted threat-omission (BC-). Both safety signals evoked equivalent autonomic and subjective learning responses but diverged strongly in terms of underlying brain activation. The conditioned inhibitor was characterized by more prominent activation of the dorsal striatum, anterior insular and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex compared to the standard safety signal, whereas the latter evoked greater activation of the ventromedial prefrontal cortex, posterior cingulate and hippocampus, among other regions. Further analyses of the conditioned inhibitor indicated that its initial learning was characterized by consistent engagement of dorsal striatal, midbrain, thalamic, premotor, and prefrontal subregions. These findings suggest that safety learning via conditioned inhibition involves a distributed cortico-striatal circuitry, separable from broader cortical regions involved with processing standard safety signals (e.g., CS-). This cortico-striatal system could represent a novel neural substrate of safety learning, underlying the initial generation of stimulus-safety associations, distinct from wider cortical correlates of safety processing, which facilitate the behavioral outcomes of learning. Significance statementIdentifying safety is critical for maintaining adaptive levels of anxiety, but the neural mechanisms of human safety learning remain unclear. Using ultra-high field fMRI, we compared learning-related brain activity for a conditioned inhibitor, which actively predicted threat-omission, and a standard safety signal (CS-), which was passively unpaired with threat. The inhibitor engaged an extended circuitry primarily featuring the dorsal striatum, along with thalamic, midbrain, and premotor/prefrontal cortex regions. The CS-exclusively involved cortical safety-related regions observed in basic safety conditioning, such as the vmPFC. These findings extend current models to include learning-specific mechanisms for encoding stimulus-safety associations, which might be distinguished from expression-related cortical mechanisms. These insights may suggest novel avenues for targeting dysfunctional safety learning in psychopathology.