In natural behaviour, animals actively interrogate their environments using endogenously generated ‘question-and-answer’ strategies. However, in laboratory settings participants typically engage with externally imposed stimuli and tasks, and the mechanisms of active sampling remain poorly understood. We review a nascent neuroscientific literature that examines active-sampling policies and their relation to attention and curiosity. We distinguish between information sampling, in which organisms reduce uncertainty relevant to a familiar task, and information search, in which they investigate in an open-ended fashion to discover new tasks. We review evidence that both sampling and search depend on individual preferences over cognitive states, including attitudes towards uncertainty, learning progress and types of information. We propose that, although these preferences are non-instrumental and can on occasion interfere with external goals, they are important heuristics that allow organisms to cope with the high complexity of both sampling and search, and generate curiosity-driven investigations in large, open environments in which rewards are sparse and ex ante unknown.

在自然行为中，动物使用内生的“问答”策略主动询问环境。但是，在实验室环境中，参与者通常会参与外部施加的刺激和任务，而主动采样的机制仍然知之甚少。我们回顾了新生的神经科学文献，该文献研究了主动采样策略及其与注意力和好奇心的关系。我们区分信息采样和信息搜索，在信息采样中，生物减少与熟悉的任务相关的不确定性；在信息搜索中，它们以开放式方式进行调查以发现新任务。我们审查了证据，即抽样和搜索均取决于个人对认知状态的偏好，包括对不确定性，学习进度和信息类型的态度。我们建议，