Ten euros now temporal discounting in Huntington disease

BackgroundWhen making decisions, one often faces a trade-off between immediate and long-term rewards. In these situations, people may prefer immediate over later rewards, even if immediate rewards are smaller than later ones; a phenomenon known as temporal discounting. In this study, we, for the first time, assessed temporal discounting in three populations: participants with manifest Huntington disease (HD), participants with premanifest HD, and control participants.MethodsUsing the temporal discounting task, we invited participants to choose between small immediate amount of money vs. delayed, but larger amount of money (e.g., Which do you prefer: you get 10 euros right now or 50 euros in a month?). We also measured inhibition in order to test if it impacts discounting performance.ResultsAnalysis demonstrated higher temporal discounting (i.e., a preference for the immediate rewards) in participants with manifest HD compared to those with premanifest HD or control participants, but no significant differences were observed in participants with premanifest HD and control participants. Analysis also demonstrated significant correlations between temporal discounting and scores on an inhibition test in participants with manifest HD, but not in those with premanifest HD or in control participants.DiscussionWe suggest that, when making decisions, patients with manifest HD may have difficulties with suppressing the temptation of smaller, but immediate, rewards.

Automated summary

This study assessed temporal discounting in three populations: participants with manifest Huntington disease (HD), participants with premanifest HD, and control participants. The results showed that participants with manifest HD had a higher preference for immediate rewards, indicating higher temporal discounting, compared to participants with premanifest HD and control participants. Additionally, significant correlations were found between temporal discounting and inhibition test scores in participants with manifest HD.