Error-related negativity and error awareness in a Go/No-go task

Lijun Wang,Antao Chen,Yan Gu,Guoxiang Zhao

doi:10.1038/s41598-020-60693-0

Lijun Wang, Antao Chen + Show 2 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-020-60693-0

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Abstract

Error monitoring is crucial for the conscious error perception, however, the role of early error monitoring in error awareness remains unclear. Here, we investigated the relation between the ERN and error-related theta oscillations and the emergence of error awareness by conducting time- and phase-locked averaging analysis based on 4–8 Hz filtered data and phase-locked time frequency analysis. Results showed that while the ERN did not differ significantly between aware and unaware errors, theta power was stronger for aware errors than for unaware errors. Further, when continuous EEG was filtered outside the theta band, the ERN results confirmed this pattern. Additionally, when the non-phase-locked component was removed from continuous EEG, stronger theta power was still observed in aware errors compared to unaware errors. Collectively, these findings may suggest that (1) the ERN emerges from phase-locked component of theta band EEG activities; (2) the ERN engages in conscious error perception and serves the emerging error awareness through the activity of theta oscillations. Thus, early error monitoring is a precursor to error awareness, but this relationship is masked by high-frequency activity in aware errors when the ERN is not filtered outside the theta band in the Go/No-go task.

Highlights

Error monitoring is crucial for the conscious error perception, the role of early error monitoring in error awareness remains unclear
When a participant responded correctly on a go trial, this trial was termed as a correct go; when a participant correctly identified that he/she responded mistakenly on a No-go trial, this trial was termed as an aware error; when a participant classified his response to a No-go trial as a correct go trial, this trial was termed as an unaware error
We examined theta activity defined in the fronto-central region by removing the non-phased-locked component from continuous EEG, the result revealed that theta power of aware errors (127.93 ± 16.04 ER%) was still significantly larger compared with unaware errors (31.00 ± 9.08 ER%), t(30) = 5.74, p < 0.001, Cohen’s d = 1.03 (Fig. 5)

Summary

Introduction

Error monitoring is crucial for the conscious error perception, the role of early error monitoring in error awareness remains unclear. Early error monitoring is a precursor to error awareness, but this relationship is masked by high-frequency activity in aware errors when the ERN is not filtered outside the theta band in the Go/No-go task. A large number of studies have investigated the neural correlates of error awareness by asking participants to subjectively report their errors, and consistently found that the late error monitoring Pe was significantly larger for aware than for unaware errors[7,8,9,10] These results suggest that Pe is related to the error awareness processing. In the Stop-signal/Go-Nogo task, participants are not required to press the button, and errors are mainly due to the failure of motor inhibition In this case, post-response conflict is weak and the effect of ERN between aware and unaware errors is reduced. The time- and phase-locked averaging analysis based on 4–8 Hz filtered data and the phase-locked time frequency analysis were conducted to examine whether the early error monitoring engaged in the error awareness processing

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