How monkeys are helping us understand why we 'choke under pressure'

Whether it's performing on stage or giving an important presentation at work, these kinds of tasks can cause some people to get overwhelmed and cause them to "choke under pressure".

But what exactly happens inside our brains when this happens?

Well, a new study has sought to understand why these scenarios can elicit this response.

The research published in the journal Neuron on September 12, involved three monkeys that had to complete tasks to get rewards and in this instance, the reward was water to drink.

In the experiment, the monkeys performed their best when had the opportunity to get a medium to large volume of water but they had a chance to win an unusually large "jackpot," they didn't perform as well as before.

The monkey's test was all about speed and accuracy as they were trained to touch a target on a screen and implanted electrodes were used to track the monkey's brain cells.

An experiment looking at how monkeys brains respond to rewards helps researchers understand why humans can "choke under pressure".iStockphoto by Getty Images

Scientists found that the monkeys were more careless when trying to win the smaller prize and too cautious when the larger prize was a stake.

After studying the monkey's brain cells, researchers found that the animals had an impaired motor preparation (when the brain prepares to execute a motion) which occurs in the motor cortex and the premotor cortex.

"They were too slow. It was as if they were worried about missing the target and focusing so much on what they were doing that they'd run out of time," Adam Smoulder, the first study author and a doctoral student at Carnegie Mellon told Live Science.

While co-senior author, and a biomedical engineering professor at Carnegie Mellon University, Steven Chase spoke to the publication about our brains having an "optimal zone" that is part of every task we do and the size of the reward can impact this - a small reward puts the brain in this zone, but a large reward can surpass it (hence why we "choke under pressure").

Research into reward processing could also help to further understand psychiatric conditions such as addiction and obsessive-compulsive disorder, and experts hope to figure out how they can utilise a person's "optimal zone" to help them achieve their peak performance.

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