Individual differences in reward prediction error: Contrasting relations between feedback-related negativity and trait measures of reward sensitivity, impulsivity and extraversion

Medial-frontal negativity occurring ~200-300 msec post-stimulus in response to motivationally salient stimuli, usually referred to as feedback related negativity (FRN), appears to be at least partly modulated by dopaminergic-based reward prediction error (RPE) signaling. Previous research (e.g. Smillie, Cooper & Pickering, 2011) has shown that higher scores on a putatively dopaminergic-based personality trait, Extraversion, were associated with a more pronounced difference wave contrasting unpredicted non-reward and unpredicted reward trials on an associative learning task. In the current study, we sought to extend this research by comparing how trait measures of Reward Sensitivity, Impulsivity and Extraversion related to the FRN using the same associative learning task. A sample of healthy adults (N = 38) completed a battery of personality questionnaires, before completing the associative learning task while EEG was recorded. As expected, FRN was most negative following unpredicted non-reward. A difference wave contrasting unpredicted non-reward and unpredicted reward trials was calculated. Extraversion, but not measures of Impulsivity, had a significant association with this difference wave. Further, the difference wave was significantly related to a measure of anticipatory pleasure, but not consummatory pleasure. These findings provide support for the existing evidence suggesting that variation in dopaminergic functioning in brain ‘reward’ pathways may partially underpin associations between the FRN and trait measures of extraversion and anticipatory pleasure

The modulating effect of personality traits on neural error monitoring: evidence from event-related FMRI.

The present study investigated the association between traits of the Five Factor Model of Personality (Neuroticism, Extraversion, Openness for Experiences, Agreeableness, and Conscientiousness) and neural correlates of error monitoring obtained from a combined Eriksen-Flanker-Go/NoGo task during event-related functional magnetic resonance imaging in 27 healthy subjects. Individual expressions of personality traits were measured using the NEO-PI-R questionnaire. Conscientiousness correlated positively with error signaling in the left inferior frontal gyrus and adjacent anterior insula (IFG/aI). A second strong positive correlation was observed in the anterior cingulate gyrus (ACC). Neuroticism was negatively correlated with error signaling in the inferior frontal cortex possibly reflecting the negative inter-correlation between both scales observed on the behavioral level. Under present statistical thresholds no significant results were obtained for remaining scales. Aligning the personality trait of Conscientiousness with task accomplishment striving behavior the correlation in the left IFG/aI possibly reflects an inter-individually different involvement whenever task-set related memory representations are violated by the occurrence of errors. The strong correlations in the ACC may indicate that more conscientious subjects were stronger affected by these violations of a given task-set expressed by individually different, negatively valenced signals conveyed by the ACC upon occurrence of an error. Present results illustrate that for predicting individual responses to errors underlying personality traits should be taken into account and also lend external validity to the personality trait approach suggesting that personality constructs do reflect more than mere descriptive taxonomies

Positive correlations with Conscientiousness in the left inferior frontal gyrus bordering the anterior insula and in ACC reaching into the medial superior frontal gyrus.

<p>Correlation coefficients were computed within an inclusive mask consisting of voxels with significant (p<0.025, family-wise corrected) error signaling during incongruent NoGo trials (see also <a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0042930#pone-0042930-t004" target="_blank">Table 4</a>.).</p

Combined Eriksen Flanker and GoNoGo fMRI paradigm, exemplary shown for all four incongruent trials.

<p>After the fixation period, one of eight possible letter strings, either congruent or incongruent, appeared on a black screen. Subjects were instructed to give a right hand index finger response, if the target letter was a “R”, to give a right hand middle finger response, if the target letter was an “U”, or to withhold response in case of appearance of target letters “P” or “V”. One of three possible feedbacks (“correct”, “wrong”, “faster”) about the subjects' response was given after a defined delay following response (in this example “correct”). <i>Upper panel</i>: Go trials. <i>Lower panel</i>: NoGo trials.</p

Inter-correlations among NEO-PI-R major domain scores.

<p>N, E, O, A, and C are the following subscales from the NEO-PI-R: N = Neuroticism; E = Extraversion; O = Openness to Experience; A = Agreeableness; C = Conscientiousness. Values are correlation coefficients; if significant associated p-values are reported in italics; n.s.: not significant.</p

Summary statistics of the different error rates (%) during the fMRI task.

<p>Values are means ± SD (standard deviation) in rounded brackets; p values stem from Newman-Keuls post-hoc tests or from paired t-tests; digits in squared brackets denote numbers of subjects who did not produce any erroneous responses on the corresponding condition-by-response type-combination. Only for the incongruent NoGo condition all subjects committed errors.</p

Main effects of error signaling for incongruent NoGo trials.

<p>Main effects are reported at a level of <i>p</i><0.025 to account for the one-sidedness of the directed t-contrast, and family-wise (FWE) corrected at the voxel level to control for multiple comparisons. x, y and z are MNI coordinates of the peak voxel within a cluster. Z: z-value of standard normal distribution; BA = Brodmann area; c: activation cluster sizes, in voxels.</p

Summary of significant positive and negative correlations between NoGo error signaling and NEO-PI-R major domain scores obtained from the reduced model after excluding scales Agreeableness, Extraversion and Openness not showing any significant correlations in the full model.

<p>Correlation coefficients were computed within an inclusive mask consisting of voxels with significant (p<0.025, family-wise corrected) error signaling during incongruent NoGo trials; x,/y/z: MNI-coordinates of the significant peak voxel in correlation analyses; Pv(FEW) indicates family-wise corrected significance of peak voxel; extent: number of significant (p<0.05, FWE) voxels; Pc(FWE): associated family-wise corrected p-value at the cluster-level; Partial R²: cluster averaged partial determination coefficient.</p