Cognitive Neuroscience, Institute of Neuroscience and Medicine (INM-3), Research Center Jülich, Jülich, Germany; Melbourne School of Psychological Sciences, University of Melbourne, Parkville, Victoria, Australia; Department of Individual Differences and Psychological Assessment, University of Cologne, Cologne, Germany.
Cognitive Neuroscience, Institute of Neuroscience and Medicine (INM-3), Research Center Jülich, Jülich, Germany; Melbourne School of Psychological Sciences, University of Melbourne, Parkville, Victoria, Australia; Department of Individual Differences and Psychological Assessment, University of Cologne, Cologne, Germany.
Neurobiol Aging. 2021 Dec;108:34-46. doi: 10.1016/j.neurobiolaging.2021.08.001. Epub 2021 Aug 8.
Metacognitive accuracy describes the degree of overlap between the subjective perception of one's decision accuracy (i.e. confidence) and objectively observed performance. With older age, the need for accurate metacognitive evaluation increases; however, error detection rates typically decrease. We investigated the effect of ageing on metacognitive accuracy using event-related potentials (ERPs) reflecting error detection and confidence: the error/correct negativity (N) and the error/correct positivity (P). Sixty-five healthy adults (20 to 76 years) completed a complex Flanker task and provided confidence ratings. We found that metacognitive accuracy declined with age beyond the expected decline in task performance, while the adaptive adjustment of behaviour was well preserved. P amplitudes following errors varied by confidence rating, but they did not mirror the reduction in metacognitive accuracy. N amplitudes decreased with age for low confidence errors. The results suggest that age-related difficulties in metacognitive evaluation could be related to an impaired integration of decision accuracy and confidence information processing. Ultimately, training the metacognitive evaluation of fundamental decisions in older adults might constitute a promising endeavour.
元认知准确性描述了主观感知自身决策准确性（即信心）与客观观察到的表现之间的重叠程度。随着年龄的增长，对准确的元认知评估的需求增加；然而，错误检测率通常会下降。我们使用反映错误检测和信心的事件相关电位（ERP）来研究年龄对元认知准确性的影响：错误/正确负性（N）和错误/正确正性（P）。65 名健康成年人（20 至 76 岁）完成了一项复杂的 Flanker 任务，并提供了信心评分。我们发现，元认知准确性的下降超出了任务表现的预期下降，而行为的适应性调整则得到了很好的保留。错误后 P 波的幅度随信心评分而变化，但与元认知准确性的降低并不相符。低信心错误的 N 波幅度随年龄而降低。研究结果表明，与年龄相关的元认知评估困难可能与决策准确性和信心信息处理的整合受损有关。最终，对老年人基本决策的元认知评估进行训练可能是一项有前途的努力。
