Midbrain dopamine neurons encode internal effort signal

Midbrain dopamine neurons of the ventral tegmental area (VTA) play a central role in both positive and negative motivation. As motivation and effort are intrinsically connected, we asked how the VTA dopamine neurons may also process internally driven effort signal. We designed two novel jumping tasks, the reward- and escape-motivated jumps, and revealed that the VTA dopamine neurons exhibit an effort-correlated activation during both jumping behaviors.