Neuronal Correlates of Metacognition in Primate Frontal Cortex

• Published in: Neuron (Cambridge, Mass.) Vol. 75; no. 3; pp. 517 - 530
• Main Authors: Middlebrooks, Paul G., Sommer, Marc A.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States Elsevier Inc 09.08.2012; Elsevier Limited
• Subjects: Animals; Brain; Cognition - physiology; Cognitive ability; Cortex (frontal); Cortex (prefrontal); Decision making; Electrophysiology; Feedback; Frontal Lobe - physiology; Macaca mulatta; Male; Metacognition; Monkeys & apes; Neurons; Neurons - physiology; Primates; Psychomotor Performance - physiology; Receptive field; Reinforcement; Saccadic eye movements; supplementary eye field
• ISSN: 0896-6273; 1097-4199
• DOI: 10.1016/j.neuron.2012.05.028

Humans are metacognitive: they monitor and control their cognition. Our hypothesis was that neuronal correlates of metacognition reside in the same brain areas responsible for cognition, including frontal cortex. Recent work demonstrated that nonhuman primates are capable of metacognition, so we recorded from single neurons in the frontal eye field, dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, and supplementary eye field of monkeys (Macaca mulatta) that performed a metacognitive visual-oculomotor task. The animals made a decision and reported it with a saccade, but received no immediate reward or feedback. Instead, they had to monitor their decision and bet whether it was correct. Activity was correlated with decisions and bets in all three brain areas, but putative metacognitive activity that linked decisions to appropriate bets occurred exclusively in the SEF. Our results offer a survey of neuronal correlates of metacognition and implicate the SEF in linking cognitive functions over short periods of time. ► Monkeys made decisions and wagered on their performance in a metacognitive task ► Single neurons were recorded in three frontal cortical regions ► Only supplementary eye field (SEF) neuronal activity correlated with metacognition ► The SEF metacognitive signal provided a temporal “bridge” between decision and bet Metacognition is the ability to monitor and control one’s cognitive functions. In a comparison between three regions of primate frontal cortex, Middlebrooks and Sommer find that neuronal activity related to metacognition is exclusive to one area, the supplementary eye field.