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Prior Expectations Bias Confidence Judgments Through Parietal Alpha-Band Modulation
Luca Tarasi1, Anna Pasini1, Domenico Romanazzi1
1Centro Studi e Ricerche in Neuroscienze Cognitive, Dipartimento di Psicologia "Renzo Canestrari", Campus di Cesena, Alma Mater Studiorum - Università di Bologna, Cesena, Italy.
Summary
Prior information influences metacognitive bias, a confidence judgment. Parietal alpha brainwave activity in the right parietal cortex was identified as a key mechanism influencing this bias.
Area of Science:
- Neuroscience
- Cognitive Psychology
- Computational Psychiatry
Background:
- Humans can assess their decision accuracy via confidence judgments.
- The influence of prior information on confidence and its neural basis are not fully understood.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate how prior expectations shape metacognitive bias.
- To identify the neural mechanisms, specifically oscillatory activity, underlying this influence.
Main Methods:
- Two studies utilized a visual detection task with probabilistic cues.
- Study 1 used electroencephalography (EEG) to measure brain activity.
- Study 2 employed continuous Theta-Burst Stimulation (cTBS) to modulate brain activity.
Main Results:
- Probabilistic cues induced a metacognitive bias dependent on cue-response congruence.
- Right-parietal alpha modulation correlated with individual differences in metacognitive bias.
- Disrupting right-parietal alpha with cTBS selectively reduced this metacognitive bias.
Conclusions:
- Parietal alpha modulation is a causal mechanism for predictive metacognition.
- This oscillatory activity selectively shapes metacognitive bias based on prior expectations.
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