Learning to deal with delayed outcomes: EEG oscillatory and slow potentials during the prefeedback interval

Area of Science:

• Cognitive Neuroscience
• Electrophysiology

Background:

• The stimulus-prepending negativity (SPN) typically decreases with task mastery, attributed to reduced anticipatory attention.
• Previous studies often used short feedback delays (<3s), potentially limiting understanding of SPN dynamics.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the influence of longer pre-feedback delays on SPN amplitude during skill acquisition.
• To explore alternative explanations for SPN modulation beyond anticipatory attention.

Main Methods:

• Utilized electroencephalography (EEG) to record brain activity during a key-pressing task with a 6-second pre-feedback delay.
• Analyzed the stimulus-prepending negativity (SPN) and lateralized sensorimotor theta activity across learning trials.

Main Results:

• The SPN diminished at frontal sites during learning, but this modulation was confined to the initial 2 seconds of the delay.
• Lateralized sensorimotor theta activity also showed a decline limited to the early part of the pre-feedback interval.

Conclusions:

• SPN diminution during learning, especially with longer delays, may involve processes beyond simple anticipatory attention.
• Action-outcome expectancy adjustments, potentially via forward models, could explain SPN modulation in the pre-feedback interval.