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Updated: Aug 11, 2025

Examining the Characteristics of Episodic Memory using Event-related Potentials in Patients with Alzheimer's Disease
Published on: August 30, 2011
Comparing event-related potentials of retrospective and prospective metacognitive judgments during episodic and
Metehan Irak1, Can Soylu2, Mustafa Yavuz3
1Department of Psychology Brain and Cognition Research Laboratory, Bahçeşehir University, Çırağan Cad. No: 4 Beşiktaş, Istanbul, 34353, Turkey. metehan.irak@eas.bau.edu.tr.
Abstract:
It is unclear whether metacognitive judgments are made on the basis of domain-generality or domain-specificity. In the current study, we compared both behavioral and event-related potential (ERP) correlates of retrospective (retrospective confidence judgments: RCJs), and prospective (feeling of knowing: FOK) metacognitive judgments during episodic and semantic memory tasks in 82 participants. Behavioral results indicated that FOK judgments reflect a domain-specific process, while RCJ reflect a domain-general process. RCJ and FOK judgments produced similar ERP waveforms within the memory tasks, but with different temporal dynamics; thus supporting the hypothesis that retrospective and prospective metacognitive judgments are distinct processes. Our ERP results also suggest that metacognitive judgments are linked to distributed neural substrates, rather than purely frontal lobe functioning. Furthermore, the role of intra-subject and inter-subject differences in metacognitive judgments across and within the memory tasks are highlighted.
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