Caring About Errors: Effects of Simulated Interpersonal Touch and Trait Intrinsic Motivation on the Error-Related Negativity

The error-related negativity (ERN or Ne) is a negative event-related brain potential that peaks about 20 to 100 ms after people perform an incorrect response in choice reaction time tasks. Prior research has shown that the ERN may be enhanced by situational and dispositional factors that promote intrinsic motivation. Building on and extending this work the present authors hypothesized that simulated interpersonal touch may increase task engagement and thereby increase ERN amplitude.

To test this notion, a group of participants (N= 20) performed a Go/No-Go task while holding a teddy bear or a same-sized cardboard box. As expected, the ERN was significantly larger when participants held a teddy bear rather than a cardboard box. The latter effect was especially pronounced for people high (rather than low) in trait intrinsic motivation.

These findings highlight simulated interpersonal touch as a motivational factor that may influence error processing, especially among people with high intrinsic motivation to perform a task. These data are referenced by: Tjew-A-Sin, M., Tops, M., Heslenfeld, D. J., & Koole, S. L. (2016). Data on simulated interpersonal touch, individual differences and the error-related negativity.

Data in Brief, 7, 1327-1330. SPSS .sav data (or .csv) and syntax file, .cnt files containing the raw EEG recordings per participant, .ev2 event files that contain participants’ responses, .wksp Brain Vision Analyzer Workspace and .ehst2/hfinf2 History files used to filter and organize the raw data.