Domain-General and Domain-Specific Patterns of Activity Supporting Metacognition in Human Prefrontal Cortex

Abstract

Metacognition is the capacity to evaluate the success of one's own cognitive processes in various domains; for example, memory and perception. It remains controversial whether metacognition relies on a domain-general resource that is applied to different tasks or if self-evaluative processes are domain specific. Here, we investigated this issue directly by examining the neural substrates engaged when metacognitive judgments were made by human participants of both sexes during perceptual and memory tasks matched for stimulus and performance characteristics. By comparing patterns of fMRI activity while subjects evaluated their performance, we revealed both domain-specific and domain-general metacognitive representations. Multivoxel activity patterns in anterior prefrontal cortex predicted levels of confidence in a domain-specific fashion, whereas domain-general signals predicting confidence and accuracy were found in a widespread network in the frontal and posterior midline. The demonstration of domain-specific metacognitive representations suggests the presence of a content-rich mechanism available to introspection and cognitive control.SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT We used human neuroimaging to investigate processes supporting memory and perceptual metacognition. It remains controversial whether metacognition relies on a global resource that is applied to different tasks or if self-evaluative processes are specific to particular tasks. Using multivariate decoding methods, we provide evidence that perceptual- and memory-specific metacognitive representations coexist with generic confidence signals. Our findings reconcile previously conflicting results on the domain specificity/generality of metacognition and lay the groundwork for a mechanistic understanding of metacognitive judgments.

Disruptions of frontoparietal control network and default mode network linking the metacognitive deficits with clinical symptoms in schizophrenia

“…The newly involving fMRI activities during the redecision phase in comparison to those during the first decision-making phase are not necessarily related to metacognition, could be generally associated with the second decision-making. However, the fMRI activities in the MCN predominately occurring during the redecision phase were subject to the decision uncertainty levels on the preceding decisions, similar to the findings in the previous studies (Fleming et al, 2012;Morales et al, 2018;Qiu et al, 2018;Wan et al, 2016). Specifically, we here found that metacognitive abilities of decision uncertainty monitoring were lower, and the strengths of fMRI activities in the MCN, especially in dACC, were consistently much more reduced in SZ than HC.…”

“…Although there have existed many clinical studies on the metacognitive deficits in SZ, a lack of operational definition of metacognitive deficits makes it difficult to use a proper experimental paradigm to investigate the underlying neural mechanisms. To date, there are growing interests in neuroscience to investigate neural mechanisms of metacognition (Fleming, Huijgen, & Dolan, 2012;Kiani & Shadlen, 2009;Miyamoto et al, 2017;Morales, Lau, & Fleming, 2018). Nevertheless, the neural accounts linking the metacognitive deficits and clinical symptoms in SZ remain largely obscure (Buchy, Stowkowy, MacMaster, Nyman, & Addington, 2015;Francis et al, 2017).…”

“…In contrast, when the decision uncertainty is high, the metacognitive processes should be evoked to revise the preceding decision. Several recent studies using functional MRI (fMRI) in simple perceptual decisionmaking tasks have shown that the frontoparietal control network (FPCN) and the salience network (SN) are associated with metacognition accompanying the decision-making task in the population of HC (Fleming et al, 2012;Morales et al, 2018;Qiu et al, 2018;Wan, Cheng, & Tanaka, 2016). The fMRI activities in these regions increase as decision uncertainty increases.…”

Believing is representation mediated by the dopamine brain system

“…Thus, beliefs guide behaviour and behaviours affect beliefs interactively. Third, the data of Babayan et al (2018) concur with the finding that perceptual and memory-specific metacognitive representations coexist with generic confidence signals (Morales, Lau, & Fleming, 2018). In fact, activity in the anterior prefrontal cortex was reported to predict levels of confidence in a domain-specific fashion, whereas domaingeneral signals predicted confidence and accuracy in frontal and parietal midline areas.…”

“…In fact, since submission of this comment, it was shown in humans that neural encoding of meaningful information is related to dopamine release capacity in the striatum and reduced dopamine receptor availability in the midbrain (Nour et al, 2018). Furthermore, there are different brain networks for introspection and cognitive control (Morales et al, 2018). Also, the anterior insula has been shown to be involved in decisions to punish following the experience of harm, while activity in the amygdala was associated with the severity of punishment (Stallen et al, 2018).…”