To err is (perfectly) human: Behavioural and neural correlates of error processing and perfectionism

Antonia Barke, Stefan Bode, Peter Dechent, Carsten Schmidt-Samoa, Christina Van Heer, Jutta Stahl

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

The attitude towards one's own imperfection strongly varies between individuals. Here, we investigated variations in errorrelated activity depending on two sub-traits of perfectionism, Personal Standard Perfectionism (PSP) and Evaluative Concern Perfectionism (ECP) in a large scale functional magnetic resonance imaging study (N=75) using a digit-flanker task. Participants with higher PSP scores showed both more post-error slowing and more neural activity in the medial-frontal gyrus including anterior cingulate cortex after errors. Interestingly, high-EC perfectionists with low PSP showed no post-error slowing and the highest activity in the middle frontal gyrus, whereas high-EC perfectionists with high PSP showed the lowest activity in this brain area and more post-error slowing. Our findings are in line with the hypothesis that perfectionists with high concerns but low standards avoid performance monitoring to avoid the worry-inducing nature of detecting personal failure and the anticipation of poor evaluation by others. However, the stronger goal-oriented performance motivation of perfectionists with high concerns and high standards may have led to less avoidance of error processing and a more intense involvement with the imperfect behaviour, which is essential for improving future performance.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)1647-1657
Number of pages11
JournalSocial cognitive and affective neuroscience
Volume12
Issue number10
DOIs
StatePublished - Oct 1 2017

Keywords

  • Behavioural adaptation
  • Evaluative concern perfectionism
  • Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI)
  • Performance monitoring
  • Personal standard perfectionism

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Experimental and Cognitive Psychology
  • Cognitive Neuroscience

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