Event-related brain potentials and vigilance performance: dissociations abound, a review

Event-related brain potentials (ERPs) have been suggested as a brain correlate of attention in sustained task performance. However, a review of the literature shows that changes in ERPs and performance measures over time often are dissociated. It is suggested that this may partly be caused by the simultaneous occurrence of several, separate processes in ERP trends over time. Further, it has been claimed that ERP recordings are more finely textured than behavioral measures such as hits, RT, sensitivity or response bias. Shortcomings of some studies are discussed and an approach is suggested which may more validly be employed in the search for relationships between time effects in ERP measures and measures of performance.