Task paradigms

Pulse paradigm

The pulse paradigm, where evidence is presented for a fixed amount of time only, is common in behavioral neuroscience. For simplicity, let us first model it without coherence dependence:

from pyddm.models import Drift
class DriftPulse(Drift):
    name = "Drift for a pulse paradigm"
    required_parameters = ["start", "duration", "drift"]
    required_conditions = []
    def get_drift(self, t, conditions, **kwargs):
        if self.start <= t <= self.start + self.duration:
            return self.drift
        return 0

Here, drift is the strength of the evidence integration during the pulse, start is the time of the pulse onset, and duration is the duration of the pulse.

Try it out with:

from pyddm import Model, Fittable
from pyddm.plot import model_gui
model = Model(drift=DriftPulse(start=Fittable(minval=0, maxval=1.5),
                               duration=Fittable(minval=0, maxval=.5),
                               drift=Fittable(minval=0, maxval=2)),
              dx=.01, dt=.01)
model_gui(model)

This can easily be modified to make it coherence dependent, where coherence is a condition in the Sample:

from pyddm.models import Drift
class DriftPulseCoh(Drift):
    name = "Drift for a coherence-dependent pulse paradigm"
    required_parameters = ["start", "duration", "drift"]
    required_conditions = ["coherence"]
    def get_drift(self, t, conditions, **kwargs):
        if self.start <= t <= self.start + self.duration:
            return self.drift * conditions["coherence"]
        return 0

Try it out with:

from pyddm import Model, Fittable
from pyddm.plot import model_gui
model = Model(drift=DriftPulseCoh(start=Fittable(minval=0, maxval=1.5),
                                  duration=Fittable(minval=0, maxval=.5),
                                  drift=Fittable(minval=0, maxval=2)),
              dx=.01, dt=.01)
model_gui(model, conditions={"coherence": [0, .3, .6]})

Alternatively, drift can be set at a default value independent of coherence, and changed during the pulse duration. In this case, there is some fixed amount of evidence, with a small burst of additionall evidence:

from pyddm.models import Drift
class DriftPulse2(Drift):
    name = "Drift for a pulse paradigm, with baseline drift"
    required_parameters = ["start", "duration", "drift", "drift0"]
    required_conditions = []
    def get_drift(self, t, conditions, **kwargs):
        if self.start <= t <= self.start + self.duration:
            return self.drift
        return self.drift0

Try it out with:

from pyddm import Model, Fittable
from pyddm.plot import model_gui
model = Model(drift=DriftPulse2(drift0=Fittable(minval=0, maxval=.5),
                                start=Fittable(minval=0, maxval=1.5),
                                duration=Fittable(minval=0, maxval=.5),
                                drift=Fittable(minval=0, maxval=2)),
              dx=.01, dt=.01)
model_gui(model)

Psychophysical Kernel paradigm

In the psychophysical kernel paradigm, random time-varying but on average unbiased stimuli are presented on a trial-by-trial basis to quantify the weight a given time point has on behavioural choice.

In particular, consider a sequence of coherences coh_t_list, generated by randomly sampling from a pool of coherences coh_list_PK for Tdur = 2 seconds every dt_PK = 0.05 seconds:

coh_list = np.array([-25.6, -12.8, -6.4, 6.4, 12.8, 25.6])
Tdur = 2
dt_PK=0.05
i_coh_t_list = np.random.randint(len(coh_list), size=int(Tdur/dt_PK))
coh_t_list = [0.01*coh_list[i] for i in i_coh_t_list]

If the conversion from coherence to “drift” is known (e.g. by fitting other tasks), one can model the DDM with this sequence of evidence:

from pyddm.models import Drift
class DriftPK(Drift):
    name = "PK drifts"
    required_conditions = ["coh_t_list", "dt_PK"]
    required_parameters = ["drift"]
    def get_drift(self, t, conditions, **kwargs):
        return self.drift**0.01*conditions["coh_t_list"][int(t/conditions["dt_PK"])]

Running the same process over multiple trials, we can use reverse correlation to obtain the impact of stimuli at each time-step on the final choice. (Note: the following step is slow, as sufficiently many trials is needed to ensure each stimulus strength at each time-step is considered):

import numpy as np
from pyddm import Model
from pyddm.models import NoiseConstant, BoundConstant, OverlayChain, OverlayNonDecision, OverlayPoissonMixture
from pyddm.functions import display_model
n_rep=1000
coh_list = np.array([-25.6, -12.8, -6.4, 6.4, 12.8, 25.6])
Tdur = 2
dt_PK=0.05
PK_Mat = np.zeros((int(Tdur/dt_PK), len(coh_list)))
PK_n   = np.zeros((int(Tdur/dt_PK), len(coh_list)))
for i_rep in range(n_rep):
    i_coh_t_list = np.random.randint(len(coh_list), size=int(Tdur/dt_PK))
    coh_t_list = [0.01*coh_list[i] for i in i_coh_t_list]
    model = Model(name='PK',
        drift=DriftPK(drift=2.2),
        noise=NoiseConstant(noise=1.5),
        bound=BoundConstant(B=1.1),
        overlay=OverlayNonDecision(nondectime=.1),
        dx=.001, dt=.01, T_dur=2)
    sol = model.solve(conditions={"coh_t_list": coh_t_list, "dt_PK": dt_PK})
    for i_t in range(int(Tdur/dt_PK)):
        PK_Mat[i_t, i_coh_t_list[i_t]] += sol.prob("correct") - sol.prob("error")
        PK_n[i_t, i_coh_t_list[i_t]] += 1
PK_Mat = PK_Mat/PK_n

Where n_rep is the number trials. PK_Mat is known as the psychophysical matrix. Normalizing by coherence and averaging across stimuli (for each time-step), one obtains the psychophysical kernel PK:

for i_coh in range(len(coh_list)):
    PK_Mat[:,i_coh] /= coh_list[i_coh]
PK = np.mean(PK_Mat, axis=1)