Delay discounting in adolescence depends on whom you wait for: Evidence from a functional neuroimaging study

With age, adolescents increasingly demonstrate the ability to forgo immediate, smaller rewards in favor of larger delayed rewards, indicating reduced delay discounting. Adolescence is also a time of social reorientation, where decisions not only involve weighing immediate against future outcomes, but also consequences for self versus those for others. In this functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging study, we examined the neural correlates of immediate and delayed reward choices where the delayed outcomes could benefit self, friends, or unknown others. A total of 196 adolescent twins aged 14–17 completed a social delay discounting task, with fMRI data acquired from 174 participants. Out of these, 156 adolescents had valid fMRI data, and 138 adolescents had observations in every condition. Adolescents more often chose the immediate reward when it was larger, and when the delay was longer. Area-under-the-curve (AUC) comparisons revealed that behavior differed across delay-beneficiaries, with AUC being highest for the self, followed by friends, and lowest for unknown others. This suggests that adolescents are more willing to wait for rewards for self. Neuroimaging analyses showed increased activity in the midline areas medial prefrontal cortex (MPFC) and precuneus, as well as bilateral temporal parietal junction (TPJ) when considering delayed reward for unknown others and friends compared to self. A whole-brain interaction with choice showed that the bilateral insula and right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) were more active for delayed choices for unknown others and for immediate choices for friends and self. This underscores that the neuro-cognitive processing of how delays reduce the value of rewards depends on closeness of the beneficiary.