Bastien Blain (PhD)

bastien.blain[@] gmail.com

http://bastienblain.weebly.com

I am now a research associate with a PhD in Economics at University College London in the Affective Brain Lab where I am working with Tali Sharot on the concept of intrinsic rewards.

Before, I was working in the Rutledge lab with Robb Rutledge, on mood dynamics and their link with decision-making. I used computational models (e.g., mood models, reinforcement learning models), lab, smartphone and online data to study mood dynamics and their relation to decision-making. I showed that understanding the world may be more important for well-being than reward. I also showed that a computational model of mood can be used together with fMRI to assess people's sensitivity to intrinsic versus extrinsic rewards. We also released a smartphone app I co-developed (https://thehappinessproject.app/).

I prepared my PhD at Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne University under the co-supervision of Mathias Pessiglione and Guillaume Hollard. The topic of my research was the link between cognitive fatigue and decision-making: How does cognitive fatigue, occurring after several hours of cognitive work (e.g., a workday) alters economical decision making (e.g., the consumption-saving trade-off).

Publications

Blain, B.*,Chew, B.*, Dolan, R., Rutledge, R., A neurocomputational model for intrinsic reward, Journal of Neuroscience, 2021. * equal contribution

Globig, L., Blain, B., Sharot, T., When Private Optimism meets Public Despair: Dissociable effects on behavior and well-being, Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, 2021

Blain, B., Sharot, T., Intrinsic Reward: Potential Cognitive and Neural Mechanisms, Current Opinion in Behavioral Sciences, 2021

Blain, B., Rutledge, R., Momentary subjective well-being depends on learning and not reward, eLife, 2020

Blain, B., Schmit,C., Aubry, A., Hausswith, C., Le Meur, Y., Pessiglione, M., Linking endurance sport to intellectual work: the impact of physical training overload on choice neural mechanisms, Current Biology, 2019

Jahn, C., Gilardeau, S., Varazzani, Blain, B., C., Sallet, J., Walton, M., Bouret, S., Dual

contributions of noradrenaline to behavioural flexibility and motivation, Psychopharmacology, 2018

Blain, B., Hollard, G., Pessiglione, M., Neural mechanisms underlying the impact of daylong

cognitive work on economic decisions, PNAS, 2016