Perceptual confidence neglects decision-incongruent evidence in the brain

Peters, Megan A. K.; Thesen, Thomas; Ko, Yoshiaki; Maniscalco, Brian; Carlson, Chad; Davidson, Matthew; Doyle, Werner; Kuzniecky, Ruben; Devinsky, Orrin; Halgren, Eric; Lau, Hakwan

doi:10.1038/s41562-017-0139

Cited by 159 publications

(240 citation statements)

References 75 publications

(61 reference statements)

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“…We investigated a previously documented bias in confidence ratings that is thought to occur because of an over-reliance of confidence computations on evidence for the chosen alternative (Koizumi et al, 2015;Maniscalco et al, 2016;Odegaard et al, 2018;Peters et al, 2017;D. Rahnev et al, 2011;D.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In contrast, a number of recent experiments have demonstrated a bias in confidence reports that renders confidence dissociable from choice accuracy. The so-called "positive evidence bias" (PEB) refers to the finding that confidence seems to over-weight the evidence in favor of the chosen option (the "positive evidence"), whereas the difficulty of the choice itself is governed by the balance of evidence between choice alternatives (Koizumi et al, 2015;Odegaard et al, 2018;Peters et al, 2017;Rausch et al, 2017;Samaha et al, 2016Samaha et al, , 2019Zylberberg et al, 2012). For example, Koizumi et al (2015) demonstrated, in a motion-direction discrimination task, that increasing the number of dots moving in the direction of the correct choice while simultaneously increasing the number of dots moving randomly does not change accuracy but increases confidence.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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The positive evidence bias in perceptual confidence is not post-decisional

Samaha

Denison

2020

Preprint

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Confidence in a perceptual decision is a subjective estimate of the accuracy of one's choice. As such, confidence is thought to be an important computation for a variety of cognitive and perceptual processes, and it features heavily in theorizing about conscious access to perceptual states. Recent experiments have revealed a "positive evidence bias" (PEB) in the computations underlying confidence reports. A PEB occurs when confidence, unlike objective choice, overweights the evidence for the chosen option, relative to evidence against the chosen option.Accordingly, in a perceptual task, appropriate stimulus conditions can be arranged that produce selective changes in confidence reports but no changes in accuracy. Although the PEB is generally assumed to reflect the observer's perceptual and/or decision processes, postdecisional accounts have not been ruled out. We therefore asked whether the PEB persisted under novel conditions that eliminated two possible post-decisional accounts: 1) post-decision evidence accumulation that contributes to a confidence report solicited after the perceptual choice, and 2) a memory bias that emerges in the delay between the stimulus offset and the confidence report. We found that even when the stimulus remained on the screen until observers responded, and when observers reported their choice and confidence simultaneously, the PEB still emerged. Signal detection-based modeling also showed that the PEB was not associated with changes to metacognitive efficiency, but rather to confidence criteria. We conclude that once-plausible post-decisional accounts of the PEB do not explain the bias, bolstering the idea that it is perceptual or decisional in nature.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The positive evidence bias in perceptual confidence is not post-decisional

Samaha

Denison

2020

Preprint

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“…To provide explanations for the group difference in spatial-frequency dependence, we first turn to why there is generally yes-response advantage in metacognition. It has been repeatedly demonstrated that metacognitive judgements are mainly based on perceptual evidence that contributed to finalize perceptual decisions [38][39][40][41]. For instance, confidence in a perceptual decision that motion was rightward is proportional to the amount of perceptual evidence for rightward motion but not that of other evidence in irrelevant motion directions.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Atypical spatial frequency dependence of visual metacognition among schizophrenia patients

Koizumi¹,

Hori

Maniscalco

et al. 2019

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Although a potential link between altered metacognition and schizophrenia has been speculated, studies have yielded inconsistent results. This may be partly because such findings would depend on the stimulus properties. Here we tested the hypothesis that metacognitive performance may be atypically modulated by spatial-frequency of visual stimuli among individuals with schizophrenia, given their altered magnocellular function. In Experiment 1, we used the signal detection theoretic measure meta-d' to quantify metacognitive performance of healthy participants in a visual detection task with confidence ratings. We then compared metacognitive performance between patients and controls with high and low spatial-frequency (HSF/LSF) stimuli outside and inside of an fMRI scanner (Experiment 2 and 3). Experiment 1 revealed that metacognitive performance is typically better after yes-(stimulus-presence) rather than after no-(stimulus-absence) responses. Experiment 2 revealed that control subjects showed such 'yes-response advantage' with HSF stimuli but not with LSF stimuli, while such spatial-frequency dependency was absent among the patients. Experiment 3 showed that the patients and controls differ in the functional connectivity between the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) and visual or parietal cortices as well as in the multivoxel decoding accuracy of perceptual confidence in DLPFC, in a spatial-frequency-dependent manner. While individuals without schizophrenia may flexibly adapt differential metacognitive computations across spatialfrequency range, patients may employ a different mechanism that is not dependent on spatialfrequency. Because visual stimuli of low spatial-frequency have been linked to top-down processing in predictive coding, this may reflect atypical functioning in these processes in schizophrenia.

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“…Based on the general model, we also examined the impact of the reliability of evidence about discriminability on the statistical pattern of confidence. Finally, we examined if relying confidence on evidence about discriminability is a beneficial strategy, or if it is an example of a suboptimal mental shortcut to the probability of being correct [6,27,[33][34][35][36], i.e. a heuristic [37,38].…”

Section: Rationale Of the Present Studymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Confidence is a metacognitive evaluation of decision making: Each choice can be accompanied by some degree of confidence that the choice is correct. In neuroscience, confidence has become a flourishing research topic, uncovering the underlying neural mechanisms in humans [1][2][3][4][5][6] as well as non-human animals [7][8][9][10][11][12][13]. A major obstacle to the scientific study of confidence is the inherently subjective nature of the psychological construct of decision confidence.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The folded X-pattern is not necessarily a statistical signature of decision confidence

Rausch

Zehetleitner

2018

Preprint

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Recent studies have traced the neural correlates of confidence in perceptual choices using statistical signatures of confidence. The most widely used statistical signature is the folded X-pattern, which was derived from a standard model of confidence assuming an objective definition of confidence as the posterior probability of making the correct choice given the evidence. The folded X-pattern entails that confidence as the subjective probability of being correct equals the probability 0.75 if the stimulus in neutral about the choice options, increases with discriminability of the stimulus in correct trials, and decreases with discriminability in incorrect trials. Here, we show that the standard model of confidence is a special case in which there is no reliable trial-by-trial evidence about discriminability itself.According to a more general model, if there is enough evidence about discriminability, objective confidence is characterised by different pattern: For both correct and incorrect choices, confidence increases with discriminability. In addition, we demonstrate the consequence if discriminability is varied in discrete steps within the standard model:confidence in choices about neutral stimuli is no longer .75. Overall, identifying neural correlates of confidence by presupposing the folded X-pattern as a statistical signature of confidence is not legitimate.

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Perceptual confidence neglects decision-incongruent evidence in the brain

Cited by 159 publications

References 75 publications

The positive evidence bias in perceptual confidence is not post-decisional

The positive evidence bias in perceptual confidence is not post-decisional

Atypical spatial frequency dependence of visual metacognition among schizophrenia patients

The folded X-pattern is not necessarily a statistical signature of decision confidence

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