Mechanismen der Fehlerdetektion: Zusammenhang zwischen Verhaltensmaßen und elektrophysiologischen Korrelaten

Detection of behavioral errors and initiation of behavioral adjustments to reduce or compensate negative consequences of errors contribute to an efficient task performance. The present work combines several studies, which investigated mechanisms of error detection by means of behavioral measures and electrophysiological correlates. Study [1] showed that error signaling and error correction depended strongly on the participants' response criterion. This supports the idea that error detection is enabled by internal error corrections. Study [2] showed that the size of the error negativity/error-related negativity (Ne/ERN) is not related to error detectability. This is incompatible with the assumption that the Ne/ERN reflects the information necessary for error detection. Study [3] demonstrated that error detectability, the Ne/ERN, and behavioral adjustments following errors are impaired with increased response set size. Taken together, the results are compatible with the idea that errors are detected by response monitoring and that the Ne/ERN reflects the significance of errors for behavioral adjustments