Variation in cortical evoked responses as a function of performance criterion

Abstract

Averaged evoked cortical responses (CER) from the scalp of human Ss were recorded within an experimental paradigm that permitted the performance criterion to be varied. The signals evoking the cortical responses were contingent upon S's pressing a button to bisect a temporal interval within certain tolerance limits. Under passive conditions averaged response waveforms lacked a second, late component that became prominent under temporal bisection conditions. The late component P 2 - N 2 increased regularly in magnitude as the performance criterion was made more stringent. The effect of performance criterion on the earlier component, N 1 - P 2, was neither as large nor as systematic as that shown by P 2 - N 2. © 1970 Psychonomic Society, Inc.