Abstract:

External feedback plays a vital role in ongoing outcome monitoring and future behavioral adjustments. Previous event-related potentials (ERPs) studies have consistently associated the feedback- related negativity (FRN) component with feedback processing after decision making. Until now, several theoretical interpretations of FRN were proposed and continuously updated in the last decade, including the classical reinforcement learning theory, affective-motivational hypothesis, reward positivity (RewP) theory, Predicted response-outcome model (PRO model) and Positive affective model. Whereas different models emphasized on different aspects, no unified theory has yet been proposed to integrate all of the existing experimental evidences. Based on these literature reviews, we argued that big-sample data, multiple and complementary technologies are highly necessary in future FRN studies. Moreover, we proposed that FRN should be considered as an electrophysiological index of reward system to investigate human behaviors in complex social interaction contexts.

Key words: feedback-related negativity, reinforcement learning, anterior cingulate cortex, reward positivity, reward prediction error