The Neural Basis of Human Error Processing Reinforcement Learning, Dopamine, and the Error-Related Negativity

• Published in: Psychological review Vol. 109; no. 4; pp. 679 - 709
• Main Authors: Holroyd, Clay B, Coles, Michael G. H
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Washington, DC American Psychological Association 01-10-2002
• Subjects: Analysis of Variance; Anatomical correlates of behavior; Behavior; Behavioral psychophysiology; Biological and medical sciences; Brain; Brain Mapping; Cingulate Cortex; Cognition; Cognition & reasoning; Dopamine; Dopamine - physiology; Error; Error-Related Negativity; Errors; Evoked Potentials; Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology; Human; Human error; Humans; Learning; Mesencephalon; Models, Neurological; Motor Cortex - physiology; Negative Reinforcement; Neurology; Probability Learning; Psychology; Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry; Psychology. Psychophysiology; Reinforcement (Psychology); Human; Dopamine; Central nervous system; Electrophysiology; Error; Midbrain; Cognition; Learning; Cingulate cortex; Information processing; Neurotransmitter; Reinforcement; Reaction time; Event evoked potential; Brain (vertebrata)
• ISSN: 0033-295X; 1939-1471
• DOI: 10.1037/0033-295X.109.4.679

The authors present a
unified account of 2 neural systems concerned with the development and expression of
adaptive behaviors: a mesencephalic dopamine system for reinforcement learning and
a"generic" error-processing system associated with the anterior
cingulate cortex. The existence of the error-processing system has been inferred from the
error-related negativity (ERN), a component of the event-related brain potential elicited
when human participants commit errors in reaction-time tasks. The authors propose that the
ERN is generated when a negative reinforcement learning signal is conveyed to the anterior
cingulate cortex via the mesencephalic dopamine system and that this signal is used by the
anterior cingulate cortex to modify performance on the task at hand. They provide support
for this proposal using both computational modeling and psychophysiological
experimentation.