Brain mechanisms of selective learning: event-related potentials provide evidence for error-driven learning in humans

Selective learning has been observed in Pavlovian conditioning in animals and in judgements of event contingencies in humans. This analogy led to the suggestion that the formation of associations underlies both types of learning. An alternative theory proposes that both tasks involve the computation of event contingencies as prescribed by probability theory. Error-driven models of learning incorporate trial-by-trial error-correction mechanisms during training whereas probabilistic models view learning merely as the storage of frequency information for later use during judgement of event contingencies. Competitive interaction between cues was observed in a contingency judgement task. Event-related brain potentials (ERPs) provided evidence for brain events related to the discrepancy between actual and expected outcomes during training thus supporting error-driven accounts of selective learning.