Individual Differences in Error‐Related Brain Activity and Post‐Error Slowing in Children

Abstract

ABSTRACT Errors play a crucial role in learning and goal‐directed behavior by triggering cognitive adjustments to optimize future task performance. One such adjustment is post‐error slowing (PES), the tendency to respond more slowly after an error. In adults, PES has been associated with regions implicated in error processing, including the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) and anterior insula. The prolonged maturation of these regions is thought to contribute to less efficient error processing in children and PES compared to adults. Additionally, while some errors may be immediately corrected, resulting in isolated errors, others may require multiple correction attempts, resulting in consecutive errors. Compared to adults, children may need more attempts to correct their errors due to the ongoing neurodevelopment of error processing. We investigated age differences in error types and in PES between children (= 159, 8–11 years) and adults (= 40, 20–30 years) during task switching. We tested whether individual differences in error processing‐related activation contributed to PES within a subsample of children that performed the task during scanning (= 72). Children made mostly consecutive errors, whereas adults made mostly isolated errors. PES magnitudes were larger in adults than in children. Children showed enhanced error‐related activity in dorsal ACC and the anterior insula. Enhanced error‐related activity in the insula was associated with better performance and reduced switch costs. These findings suggest that the neurodevelopment of error processing in late childhood contributes to the improved ability to adjust behavior following errors, and consequently to task‐switching performance. Key Points During task switching, children produced longer series of errors, whereas adults were more likely to correct their errors immediately after committing them. Unlike adults, children did not slow down after making an error to correct their performance. hbm70581-li-0001 Among children, those who demonstrated greater post‐error slowing were more likely to show higher task‐switching performance, suggesting adaptive post‐error adjustments in children. hbm70581-li-0002 During error processing, children showed increased activation in the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex and the anterior insula. Error‐related insular activation was associated with improved task performance, indicating that enhanced error processing contributes to adaptive performance adjustments during task switching. hbm70581-li-0003 bullet hbm70581-list-0001 highlights hbm70581-abs-5002 During task switching, children produced longer error series and showed less post‐error slowing than adults. During and after errors, children showed increased activation in cingulate, insular, and prefrontal regions. Children's post‐error slowing and error‐related insular activation were associated with improved performance, indicating that error processing contributes to adaptive performance adjustments. graphical