Self-Monitoring – Neurology

Different aspects of self-monitoring originate in different parts of the brain.1

Performance monitoring appears to happen in the posterior medial frontal cortex (pMFC),2 particularly “the detection and prediction of errors.”1

The medial PFC, especially the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) have been implicated as “critical areas supporting performance monitoring, response selection, and performance adjustment.”3 The ACC as well as the insula are (ALSO? or In particular??) responsible for the “conscious awareness” of one’s emotional, mental, and physical states (interoception). The size of the ACC has been linked to introspective accuracy.3 The anterior insula (AI) in also linked to the “affective evaluation of errors, by evaluating the results of error detection “in a broader context of agency and social factors.”1

“One of the most reliable neural markers of performance monitoring is the error-related negativity (ERN), an event-related potential that represents a neurophysiological response”4 that is “generated as a result of neural connectivity between [the] PFC and ACC.”3 the magnitude of ERNs have been found to be responsive to incentives and the setting of accuracy goals, which suggest that they are not only related to error detection, but subsequent “affect and motivation” as well. 4

Sources:

  1. 1.
    Cracco E, Desmet C, Brass M. When your error becomes my error: anterior insula activation in response to observed errors is modulated by agency. Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience. September 2015:357-366. doi:10.1093/scan/nsv120
  2. 2.
    Ninomiya T, Noritake A, Ullsperger M, Isoda M. Performance monitoring in the medial frontal cortex and related neural networks: From monitoring self actions to understanding others’ actions. Neuroscience Research. December 2018:1-10. doi:10.1016/j.neures.2018.04.004
  3. 3.
    Lyons KE, Zelazo PD. Monitoring, metacognition, and executive function. In: Advances in Child Development and Behavior. Elsevier; 2011:379-412. doi:10.1016/b978-0-12-386491-8.00010-4
  4. 4.
    Teper R, Inzlicht M. Meditation, mindfulness and executive control: the importance of emotional acceptance and brain-based performance monitoring. Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience. May 2012:85-92. doi:10.1093/scan/nss045