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Albrecht C, Bellebaum C. Slip or fallacy? Effects of error severity on own and observed pitch error processing in pianists. COGNITIVE, AFFECTIVE & BEHAVIORAL NEUROSCIENCE 2023:10.3758/s13415-023-01097-1. [PMID: 37198385 PMCID: PMC10400674 DOI: 10.3758/s13415-023-01097-1] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 03/27/2023] [Indexed: 05/19/2023]
Abstract
Errors elicit a negative, mediofrontal, event-related potential (ERP), for both own errors (error-related negativity; ERN) and observed errors (here referred to as observer mediofrontal negativity; oMN). It is unclear, however, if the action-monitoring system codes action valence as an all-or-nothing phenomenon or if the system differentiates between errors of different severity. We investigated this question by recording electroencephalography (EEG) data of pianists playing themselves (Experiment 1) or watching others playing (Experiment 2). Piano pieces designed to elicit large errors were used. While active participants' ERN amplitudes differed between small and large errors, observers' oMN amplitudes did not. The different pattern in the two groups of participants was confirmed in an exploratory analysis comparing ERN and oMN directly. We suspect that both prediction and action mismatches can be coded in action monitoring systems, depending on the task, and a need-to-adapt signal is sent whenever mismatches happen to indicate the magnitude of the needed adaptation.
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Affiliation(s)
- Christine Albrecht
- Institute of Experimental Psychology, Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf, Universitätsstraße 1, building 23.03, room number 00.89, 40225, Düsseldorf, Germany.
| | - Christian Bellebaum
- Institute of Experimental Psychology, Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf, Universitätsstraße 1, building 23.03, room number 00.89, 40225, Düsseldorf, Germany
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Egan S, Ghio M, Bellebaum C. Auditory N1 and P2 Attenuation in Action Observation: An Event-Related Potential Study Considering Effects of Temporal Predictability and Individualism. Biol Psychol 2023; 180:108575. [PMID: 37156324 DOI: 10.1016/j.biopsycho.2023.108575] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/16/2023] [Revised: 04/30/2023] [Accepted: 05/04/2023] [Indexed: 05/10/2023]
Abstract
Tones that are generated by self-performed actions elicit attenuated N1 and P2 amplitudes, as measured by electroencephalography (EEG), compared to identical external tones, which is referred to as neurophysiological sensory attenuation (SA). At the same time, self-generated tones are perceived as less loud compared to external tones (perceptual SA). Action observation led in part to a similar neurophysiological and perceptual SA. The perceptual SA in observers was found in comparison to tones that were temporally predictable, and one study suggested that perceptual SA in observers might depend on the cultural dimension of individualism. In this study, we examined neurophysiological SA for tones elicited by self-performed and observed actions during simultaneous EEG acquisitions in two participants, extending the paradigm with a visual cue condition controlling for effects of temporal predictability. Moreover, we investigated the effect of individualism on neurophysiological SA in action observation. Relative to un-cued external tones, the N1 was only descriptively reduced for tones that were elicited by self-performed or observed actions and significantly attenuated for cued external tones. A P2 attenuation effect relative to un-cued external tones was found in all three conditions, with stronger effects for self- and other-generated tones than for cued external tones. We found no evidence for an effect of individualism. These findings add to previous evidence for neurophysiological SA in action performance and observation with a paradigm well-controlled for the effect of predictability and individualism, showing differential effects of the former on the N1 and P2 components, and no effect of the latter.
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Affiliation(s)
- Sophie Egan
- Institute of Experimental Psychology, Heinrich Heine University, Düsseldorf, Germany.
| | - Marta Ghio
- Institute of Experimental Psychology, Heinrich Heine University, Düsseldorf, Germany.
| | - Christian Bellebaum
- Institute of Experimental Psychology, Heinrich Heine University, Düsseldorf, Germany.
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Musco MA, Zazzera E, Paulesu E, Sacheli LM. Error observation as a window on performance monitoring in social contexts? A systematic review. Neurosci Biobehav Rev 2023; 147:105077. [PMID: 36758826 DOI: 10.1016/j.neubiorev.2023.105077] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/27/2022] [Revised: 01/31/2023] [Accepted: 02/03/2023] [Indexed: 02/10/2023]
Abstract
Living in a social world requires social monitoring, i.e., the ability to keep track of others' actions and mistakes. Here, we demonstrate the good reliability of the behavioral and neurophysiological indexes ascribed to social monitoring. We also show that no consensus exists on the cognitive bases of this phenomenology and discuss three alternative hypotheses: (i) the direct matching hypothesis, postulating that observed errors are processed through automatic simulation; (ii) the attentional hypothesis, considering errors as unexpected events that take resources away from task processing; and (iii) the goal representation hypothesis, which weighs social error monitoring depending on how relevant the other's task is to the observer's goals. To date, evidence on the role played by factors that could help to disentangle these hypotheses (e.g., the human vs. non-human nature of the actor, the error rate, and the reward context) is insufficient, although the goal representation hypothesis seems to receive more support. Theory-driven experimental designs are needed to enlighten this debate and clarify the role of error monitoring during interactive exchanges.
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Affiliation(s)
- Margherita Adelaide Musco
- Department of Psychology and Milan Center for Neuroscience (NeuroMi), University of Milano-Bicocca, Piazza dell'Ateneo Nuovo 1, 20126 Milan, Italy.
| | - Elisa Zazzera
- Department of Psychology and Milan Center for Neuroscience (NeuroMi), University of Milano-Bicocca, Piazza dell'Ateneo Nuovo 1, 20126 Milan, Italy
| | - Eraldo Paulesu
- Department of Psychology and Milan Center for Neuroscience (NeuroMi), University of Milano-Bicocca, Piazza dell'Ateneo Nuovo 1, 20126 Milan, Italy; IRCCS Istituto Ortopedico Galeazzi, via Riccardo Galeazzi 4, 20161 Milano, Italy
| | - Lucia Maria Sacheli
- Department of Psychology and Milan Center for Neuroscience (NeuroMi), University of Milano-Bicocca, Piazza dell'Ateneo Nuovo 1, 20126 Milan, Italy.
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Albrecht C, Bellebaum C. Disentangling effects of expectancy, accuracy, and empathy on the processing of observed actions. Psychophysiology 2021; 58:e13883. [PMID: 34196017 DOI: 10.1111/psyp.13883] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/09/2020] [Revised: 05/05/2021] [Accepted: 06/01/2021] [Indexed: 11/30/2022]
Abstract
A number of studies suggest that event-related potential (ERP) components previously associated with error processing might represent expectation violation instead of valence. When observing others, these processes might further be modulated by trait empathy. We suggest that trait empathy modulates expectancy formation and that these expectancies then influence observed response processing as reflected in a frontocentral negative ERP component resembling the previously described observer error-related negativity. We acquired single trial ERPs of participants who observed another person in a true- or false-belief condition answering correctly or erroneously. Additionally, we prompted participants' expectancy in some trials. Using linear mixed model analyses, we found that for low empathy participants, expectations for the false-belief condition decreased throughout the experiment, so that expectations were more pronounced in participants with higher empathy toward the end of the experiment. We also found that single trial expectancy measures derived from regression models of the measured expectancies predicted the amplitude of the frontocentral negative ERP component, and that neither the addition of empathy nor accuracy or trial type (true- or false-belief) led to the explanation of significantly more variance compared with the model just containing expectancy as predictor. These results suggest that empathy modulates the processing of observed responses indirectly via its effect on expectancy of the response.
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Affiliation(s)
- Christine Albrecht
- Institute of Experimental Psychology, Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf, Düsseldorf, Germany
| | - Christian Bellebaum
- Institute of Experimental Psychology, Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf, Düsseldorf, Germany
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Peterburs J, Albrecht C, Bellebaum C. The impact of social anxiety on feedback-based go and nogo learning. PSYCHOLOGICAL RESEARCH 2021; 86:110-124. [PMID: 33527222 PMCID: PMC8821493 DOI: 10.1007/s00426-021-01479-5] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/17/2020] [Accepted: 01/11/2021] [Indexed: 11/29/2022]
Abstract
The term “Pavlovian” bias describes the phenomenon that learning to execute a response to obtain a reward or to inhibit a response to avoid punishment is much easier than learning the reverse. The present study investigated the interplay between this learning bias and individual levels of social anxiety. Since avoidance behavior is a hallmark feature of social anxiety and high levels of social anxiety have been associated with better learning from negative feedback, it is conceivable that the Pavlovian bias is altered in individuals with high social anxiety, with a strong tendency to avoid negative feedback, especially (but not only) in a nogo context. In addition, learning may be modulated by the individual propensity to learn from positive or negative feedback, which can be assessed as a trait-like feature. A sample of 84 healthy university students completed an orthogonalized go/nogo task that decoupled action type (go/nogo) and outcome valence (win/avoid) and a probabilistic selection task based upon which the individual propensity to learn from positive and negative feedback was determined. Self-reported social anxiety and learning propensity were used as predictors in linear mixed-effect model analysis of performance accuracy in the go/nogo task. Results revealed that high socially anxious subjects with a propensity to learn better from negative feedback showed particularly pronounced learning for nogo to avoid while lacking significant learning for nogo to win as well as go to avoid. This result pattern suggests that high levels of social anxiety in concert with negative learning propensity hamper the overcoming of Pavlovian bias in a win context while facilitating response inhibition in an avoidance context. The present data confirm the robust Pavlovian bias in feedback-based learning and add to a growing body of evidence for modulation of feedback learning by individual factors, such as personality traits. Specifically, results show that social anxiety is associated with altered Pavlovian bias, and might suggest that this effect could be driven by altered basal ganglia function primarily affecting the nogo pathway.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jutta Peterburs
- Department of Biological Psychology, Institute of Experimental Psychology, Heinrich-Heine-University Düsseldorf, Universitätsstraße 1, 40225, Düsseldorf, Germany. .,Department of Medicine, Medical Psychology, MSH Medical School Hamburg, Am Kaiserkai 1, 20457, Hamburg, Germany.
| | - Christine Albrecht
- Department of Biological Psychology, Institute of Experimental Psychology, Heinrich-Heine-University Düsseldorf, Universitätsstraße 1, 40225, Düsseldorf, Germany
| | - Christian Bellebaum
- Department of Biological Psychology, Institute of Experimental Psychology, Heinrich-Heine-University Düsseldorf, Universitätsstraße 1, 40225, Düsseldorf, Germany
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Effects of trait empathy and expectation on the processing of observed actions. COGNITIVE AFFECTIVE & BEHAVIORAL NEUROSCIENCE 2020; 21:156-171. [PMID: 33296041 PMCID: PMC7994233 DOI: 10.3758/s13415-020-00857-7] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 11/23/2020] [Indexed: 11/08/2022]
Abstract
Recent evidence suggests that the processing of observed actions may reflect an action prediction error, with more pronounced mediofrontal negative event-related potentials (ERPs) for unexpected actions. This evidence comes from an application of a false-belief task, where unexpected correct responses elicited high ERP amplitudes. An alternative interpretation is that the ERP component reflects vicarious error processing, as objectively correct responses were errors from the observed person's perspective. In this study, we aimed to disentangle the two possibilities by adding the factor task difficulty, which varied expectations without affecting the definition of (vicarious) errors, and to explore the role of empathy in action observation. We found that the relationship between empathy and event-related potentials (ERPs) mirrored the relationship between empathy and behavioral expectancy measures. Only in the easy task condition did higher empathy lead to stronger expectancy of correct responses in the true-belief and of errors in the false-belief condition. A compatible pattern was found for an early ERP component (150-200 ms) after the observed response, with a larger negativity for error than correct responses in the true-belief and the reverse pattern in the false-belief condition, but only in highly empathic participants. We conclude that empathy facilitates the formation of expectations regarding the actions of others. These expectations then modulate the processing of observed actions, as indicated by the ERPs in the present study.
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