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The Journal of Neuroscience, April 30, 2008, 28(18):4671-4678; doi:10.1523/JNEUROSCI.4400-07.2008
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Behavioral/Systems/Cognitive
Anticipatory Activity in Anterior Cingulate Cortex Can Be Independent of Conflict and Error Likelihood
Esther Aarts,1,2 Ardi Roelofs,1,2 andMiranda van Turennout1,3 1F. C. Donders Centre for Cognitive Neuroimaging, Radboud University Nijmegen, 6500 HB Nijmegen, The Netherlands, and 2Nijmegen Institute for Cognition and Information and 3Behavioural Science Institute, Radboud University Nijmegen, 6500 HE Nijmegen, The Netherlands
Correspondence should be addressed to Esther Aarts, F. C. Donders Centre for Cognitive Neuroimaging, Radboud University Nijmegen, P.O. Box 9101, 6500 HB Nijmegen, The Netherlands. Email: e.aarts{at}fcdonders.ru.nl
Previous studies have found no agreement on whether anticipatory activity in the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) reflects upcoming conflict, error likelihood, or actual control adjustments. Using event-related functional magnetic resonance imaging, we investigated the nature of preparatory activity in the ACC. Informative cues told the participants whether an upcoming target would or would not involve conflict in a Stroop-like task. Uninformative cues provided no such information. Behavioral responses were faster after informative than after uninformative cues, indicating cue-based adjustments in control. ACC activity was larger after informative than uninformative cues, as would be expected if the ACC is involved in anticipatory control. Importantly, this activation in the ACC was observed for informative cues even when the information conveyed by the cue was that the upcoming target evokes no response conflict and has low error likelihood. This finding demonstrates that the ACC is involved in anticipatory control processes independent of upcoming response conflict or error likelihood. Moreover, the response of the ACC to the target stimuli was critically dependent on whether the cue was informative or not. ACC activity differed among target conditions after uninformative cues only, indicating ACC involvement in actual control adjustments. Together, these findings argue strongly for a role of the ACC in anticipatory control independent of anticipated conflict and error likelihood, and also show that such control can eliminate conflict-related ACC activity during target processing. Models of frontal cortex conflict-detection and conflict-resolution mechanisms require modification to include consideration of these anticipatory control properties of the ACC.
Key words: Stroop task; response conflict; preparation; cue-based adjustments; fMRI; neuroimaging
Received Sept. 26, 2007; revised March 11, 2008; accepted March 27, 2008.
Correspondence should be addressed to Esther Aarts, F. C. Donders Centre for Cognitive Neuroimaging, Radboud University Nijmegen, P.O. Box 9101, 6500 HB Nijmegen, The Netherlands. Email: e.aarts{at}fcdonders.ru.nl
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