Department of Psychology, University of Oregon, Eugene, OR, USA.
Department of Psychology, Florida International University, Miami, FL, USA.
Dev Psychobiol. 2021 Jul;63(5):1611-1625. doi: 10.1002/dev.22086. Epub 2021 Feb 3.
Motivation influences cognitive control, particularly in childhood and adolescence. Previous work finds that the error-related negativity (ERN), an event-related potential (ERP) linked to cognitive control following errors, is influenced by social motivation. However, it is unclear whether the influences of social motivation on the ERN extend to stimulus-locked neural correlates of cognitive control. This study reexamines how social motivation influences cognitive control in adolescence by exploring motivational influences on two stimulus-locked ERPs; the N2 and P3. Adolescent girls (8-17 years of age) completed a flanker task under two different conditions. In the social condition, girls were led to believe that they were evaluated by a peer during a flanker task. In the nonsocial condition, girls completed a flanker task while evaluated by a computer. Results revealed that all girls exhibited a larger P3 in social as compared to nonsocial contexts, whereas the N2 was not different between contexts. In addition, the largest P3 enhancements were observed among younger girls. These findings suggest that social motivation influences some ERP components related to cognitive control, and such influences change across development. Additionally, findings suggest the importance of including multiple ERPs when interpreting the functional significance of motivation on cognitive control.
动机影响认知控制，尤其是在儿童和青少年时期。先前的研究发现，错误相关负波（ERN）是一种与错误后认知控制相关的事件相关电位（ERP），它受到社会动机的影响。然而，目前尚不清楚社会动机对 ERN 的影响是否会扩展到刺激锁定的认知控制神经相关物。本研究通过探索动机对两种刺激锁定 ERPs（N2 和 P3）的影响，重新考察了社会动机如何影响青少年的认知控制。在社会条件下，女孩们被引导相信在进行侧抑制任务时会受到同龄人的评价。在非社会条件下，女孩们在被电脑评价的情况下完成侧抑制任务。结果表明，与非社会情境相比，所有女孩在社会情境中均表现出更大的 P3，而 N2 在两种情境中没有差异。此外，在年龄较小的女孩中观察到最大的 P3 增强。这些发现表明，社会动机影响与认知控制相关的一些 ERP 成分，并且这种影响会随着发展而变化。此外，研究结果表明，在解释动机对认知控制的功能意义时，纳入多个 ERP 很重要。
