states in response to stimuli. Physiological changes (such as muscle tone, heart rate, endocrine activity, posture, facial expression, and so forth) occur in the body and are relayed to the brain where they are transformed into an emotion that tells the individual something about the stimulus that they have encountered. Over time, emotions and their corresponding bodily changes, which are called "somatic markers", become associated with particular situations and their past outcomes. When making subsequent decisions, these somatic markers and their evoked emotions are consciously or unconsciously associated with their past outcomes, and influence decision-making in favor of some behaviors instead of others. For instance, when a somatic marker associated with a positive outcome is perceived, the person may feel happy and thereby motivated to pursue that behavior. When a somatic marker associated with the negative outcome is perceived, the person may feel sad, which acts as an internal alarm to warn the individual to avoid that course of action. These situation-specific somatic states based on, and reinforced by, past experiences help to guide behavior in favor of more advantageous choices, and therefore are adaptive. According to the hypothesis, two distinct pathways reactivate somatic marker responses. In the first pathway, emotion can be evoked by changes in the body that are projected to the brain – called the "body loop". For instance, encountering a feared object like a snake may initiate the fight-or-flight response and cause fear. In the second pathway, cognitive representations of the emotions (imagining an unpleasant situation "as if" you were in that particular situation) can be activated in the brain without being directly elicited by a sensory stimulus – called the "as-if body loop". Thus, the brain can anticipate expected bodily changes, which allows the individual to respond faster to external stimuli without waiting for an event to actually occur. The amygdala and VMPFC (a subsection of the orbitomedial prefrontal cortex or OMPFC) are essential components of this hypothesized mechanism, and therefore damage to either structure will disrupt decision-making. Experimental evidence In an effort to produce a simple neuropsychological tool that would assess deficits in emotional processing, decision-making, and social skills of OMPFC-lesioned individuals, Bechara and collaborators created the Iowa gambling task. The task measures a form of emotion-based learning. Studies using the gambling task have found deficits in various neurological (such as amygdala and OMPFC lesions) and psychiatric populations (such as schizophrenia, mania, and drug