Restricting temptations: neural mechanisms of precommitment
Crockett and colleagues used functional magnetic resonance imaging to compare precommitment, where people voluntarily restrict their own access to a temptation, with willpower. Precommitment made people more likely than willpower to choose large delayed rewards, and the effect was stronger in more impulsive people. Willpower was linked to activity in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, posterior parietal cortex and inferior frontal gyrus, and precommitment to activity in the lateral frontopolar cortex, whose connectivity with those regions rose during precommitment. The authors propose a hierarchical model in which the frontopolar cortex coordinates self-control.
Crockett and colleagues used functional magnetic resonance imaging to compare precommitment, where people voluntarily restrict their own access to a temptation, with willpower. Precommitment made people more likely than willpower to choose large delayed rewards, and the effect was stronger in more impulsive people. Willpower was linked to activity in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, posterior parietal cortex and inferior frontal gyrus, and precommitment to activity in the lateral frontopolar cortex, whose connectivity with those regions rose during precommitment. The authors propose a hierarchical model in which the frontopolar cortex coordinates self-control.
Written from the abstract read 2026-10-27 via OpenAlex.
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Crockett, M. J., Braams, B. R., Clark, L., Tobler, P. N., Robbins, T. W., & Kalenscher, T. (2013). Restricting temptations: neural mechanisms of precommitment. Neuron, 79(2), 391-401. doi:10.1016/j.neuron.2013.05.028