Post-error behavior in active cocaine users: Poor awareness of errors in the presence of intact performance adjustments

Abstract

Active cocaine abusers have a diminished neural response to errors, particularly in the anterior cingulate cortex thought critical to error processing. The inability to detect, or adjust performance following errors has been linked to clinical symptoms including the loss of insight and perseverative behavior. We investigated the cognitive implications of this diminished error-related activity, using response inhibition tasks that required error awareness and performance adaptation. Twenty-one active cocaine users (six female subjects, mean age=40.3) and 22 non-drug using adults (six female subjects, mean=39.9) participated. The results indicated that cocaine users consistently demonstrated p..