Behavioral Characteristics And Neural Mechanisms Of Post-error Responses In Multi-source Conflict Task

Error are frequent and inevitable events in our lives,and when they occur,we always engage in a series of behavioral responses or autonomous control to adjust and avoid their recurrence.Especially in complex and variable or high-conflict task situations,the individual’s brain will flexibly adjust the conflict and suppress irrelevant information through cognitive control processes in order to optimize the current behavior and reconnect the behavior with the current task situation in a timely manner,thus promoting behavioral adaptation and effectively improving task performance.By studying the behavioral characteristics and neural mechanisms of post-error responses,it is beneficial to understand the behavioral adjustment of human post-error responses,and focusing on post-error behavioral performance and its effects and interventions is also the key to improve the human-computer ergonomics problem of complex systems.In this study,the experimental paradigm of Simon + Stop Signal fusion was adopted by using behavioral experiments and near-infrared spectroscopy(NIRS),and the Stop Signal task was added to the Simon task to combine conflict inhibition at the cognitive level and response inhibition at the behavioral level,which increased the difficulty of the overall experimental task and increased the occurrence of errors in order to more effectively examine the individual’s The overall difficulty of the experimental task was increased,and the occurrence of errors was increased to more effectively examine individual responses after the occurrence of errors.Specifically,Experiment 1 used a twofactor experimental design of 2(consistency: consistent vs.inconsistent)× 2(reactivity:GO vs.Stop-Signal)to examine the patterns of behavioral responses after errors from a behavioral perspective.Experiment 2 incorporated near-infrared spectroscopic imaging to further examine the brain neurophysiological mechanisms of post-error behavioral responses(e.g.,reaction-time prolongation effect)from a neurophysiological perspective,and Pearson’s correlation was used to explore the link between post-error behavioral responses and intracerebral activation to clarify the relationship between behavioral performance indicators and brain neurophysiological indicators.The behavioral results revealed that(1)both Experiment 1 and Experiment 2 showed a significant post-error reaction time lengthening effect,i.e.,the reaction time of the trial after the error response was significantly longer than that of the trial after the correct response.(2)The experiment showed a borderline significant post-error correct rate reduction phenomenon,while a significantly higher post-error correct rate was found in Experiment 2 with an increased response trial interval,suggesting that the post-error occurrence may contain two adaptive and non-adaptive processes with different time courses;(3)A post-error interference effect reduction effect was observed in Experiment1,but this effect was not found in Experiment 2;(4)Notably,our experimental task also examined response inhibition at the behavioral level,with a significant interaction between response type(post-error vs.post-correct)and reactivity(GO vs.Stop-Signal).The results of Experiment 2 found that after correct responses,the reaction time after Stop-Signal responses was significantly longer than the reaction time after GO responses,whereas after incorrect responses,there was no significant difference.This suggests that the occurrence of errors has an effect on our inhibitory control.The results of intracerebral activation suggest that,on the one hand,when individuals were completing a multisource conflict task,brain areas associated with inhibitory control,the dorsolateral prefrontal and preadjunct motor areas,showed significant activation during correct responses,and brain activation in the Stop-Signal condition was significantly greater in the dorsolateral prefrontal than in the GO condition;indicating that the dorsolateral prefrontal exerted executive control and inhibited the interference stimulus On the other hand,when errors occurred,significant differences were found in bilateral dorsolateral prefrontal,right inferior frontal gyrus,primary motor area and preadjacent motor area compared to activation after correct responses,suggesting that the above brain areas are generally involved in post-error response adjustment in conflict tasks and that individuals need to mobilize more cognitive resources from the above brain areas after errors occur.Individuals need to mobilize more cognitive resources from these brain areas after an error occurs.Significant activation of primary motor areas was associated with a tendency to respond correctly after an error.The dorsolateral prefrontal and inferior frontal gyrus,located in the prefrontal cortex,are both closely related to inhibitory control,validating previous studies that the dorsolateral prefrontal lobes play a major role in error adjustment during error processing,and importantly,we also found significant activation in the right inferior frontal gyrus after error occurrence,suggesting a direct relationship between the right inferior frontal gyrus in post-error responses,as evidenced by the results of the correlation analysis.Our correlation analysis between intracerebral activation and behavioral performance revealed that the post-error brain activation values of channel 11,located in the inferior frontal gyrus,and channel 28,located in the anterior supplementary motor area,were significantly correlated with the post-error response time.However,it is noteworthy that channel 11 located in the inferior frontal gyrus was positively correlated with it,and the inferior frontal gyrus was associated with selective inhibition of action impulses,suggesting that in the presence of errors and conflicting choices,individuals occupy increased inhibitory control resources,resulting in an increase in next-trial reaction time;whereas channel 28 located in the pre-auxiliary motor area was negatively correlated with it,and the decrease in activity in the pre-auxiliary motor area after errors may reflect an increase in response threshold The decrease in activity in the premotor area after an error may reflect an increase in response threshold,resulting in higher motor inhibition and therefore a prolonged reaction time effect after an error.The post-error correctness of channel 7 in the dorsolateral prefrontal lobe and channel 11 in the inferior frontal gyrus were both significantly and negatively correlated with intracerebral activation.And after the mediation effect analysis we found that individual intracerebral activation(channel 11)played a partially mediating role between response type and posterror correct rate,and response type could predict post-error correct rate through brain activation in the inferior frontal gyrus.In summary,we examined the behavioral features of post-error responses,including post-error slowing and post-error correct rate changes,generally supported the dynamic mixed theory of post-error behavior,confirmed the post-error activation of brain regions in the dorsolateral prefrontal,anterior supplementary motor area and primary motor area,and found correlations between the frontal inferior gyrus and the behavioral performance of post-error responses(reaction time,correct rate),providing The brain neurophysiological evidence related to the post-error response provides some insight for future studies related to the post-error response.The study of post-error responses not only helps us to understand the behavioral characteristics and neural mechanisms of posterror responses,but also helps us to recover the state quickly after an error and improve the operational efficiency,which is important for the survival and development of individuals(e.g.,occupational groups that apply human-computer interaction).