Dissociating action inhibition, conflict monitoring and sensory mismatch into independent components of event related potentials in GO/NOGO task

The anterior N2 and P3 waves of event related potentials (ERPs) in the GO/NOGO paradigm in trials related to preparatory set violations in previous studies were inconsistently associated either with action inhibition or conflict monitoring operations. In the present study a paired stimulus GO/NOGO design was used in order to experimentally control the preparatory sets. Three variants of the same stimulus task manipulated sensory mismatch, action inhibition and conflict monitoring operations by varying stimulus-response associations. The anterior N2 and P3 waves were decomposed into components by means of independent component analysis (ICA). The ICA was performed on collection of 114 individual ERPs in the three experimental conditions. Three of the independent components were selectively affected by the task manipulations indicating association of these components with sensory mismatch, action inhibition and conflict monitoring operations. According to sLORETA the sensory mismatch component was generated in the left and right temporal areas, the action suppression component was generated in the supplementary motor cortex, and the conflict monitoring component was generated in the anterior cingulate cortex.

►Sensory mismatch, action inhibition and conflict monitoring were manipulated in GO/NOGO tasks. ►The anterior N2 and P3 ERP waves to NOGO cues were decomposed into independent components (ICs). ►ICs coupled with the visual mismatch were generated in the left and right temporal areas. ►IC coupled with action suppression was generated in the supplementary motor cortex. ►IC coupled with conflict monitoring was generated in the anterior cingulate cortex.