Wills A J, Lavric A, Croft G S, Hodgson T L
School of Psychology, University of Exeter, England, UK.
J Cogn Neurosci. 2007 May;19(5):843-54. doi: 10.1162/jocn.2007.19.5.843.
Prediction error ("surprise") affects the rate of learning: We learn more rapidly about cues for which we initially make incorrect predictions than cues for which our initial predictions are correct. The current studies employ electrophysiological measures to reveal early attentional differentiation of events that differ in their previous involvement in errors of predictive judgment. Error-related events attract more attention, as evidenced by features of event-related scalp potentials previously implicated in selective visual attention (selection negativity, augmented anterior N1). The earliest differences detected occurred around 120 msec after stimulus onset, and distributed source localization (LORETA) indicated that the inferior temporal regions were one source of the earliest differences. In addition, stimuli associated with the production of prediction errors show higher dwell times in an eye-tracking procedure. Our data support the view that early attentional processes play a role in human associative learning.
预测误差（“意外”）会影响学习速度：相较于最初预测正确的线索，我们会更快地了解那些最初预测错误的线索。当前的研究采用电生理测量方法，以揭示在预测判断错误中曾涉及不同过往事件的早期注意分化。与错误相关的事件会吸引更多注意力，这一点已被先前与选择性视觉注意相关的事件相关头皮电位特征（选择负波、增强的前部N1）所证实。检测到的最早差异出现在刺激开始后约120毫秒，分布式源定位（LORETA）表明颞下区域是最早差异的来源之一。此外，在眼动追踪过程中，与预测误差产生相关的刺激显示出更长的注视时间。我们的数据支持这样一种观点，即早期注意过程在人类联想学习中发挥作用。
