Abstract
Recent studies have reported that there is a component of the event-related brain potential, an error-related negativity (ERN), that is related to error detection in choice reaction time tasks. The present study examined whether or not the ERN reflects mental resource allocated to error detection using the single and dual tasks. Only Eriksen flanker task was used in the single task condition. Eriksen flanker task was used as a primary task and an auditory choice reaction time task was used as a secondary task in the dual task conditions. In addition, we manipulated the task difficulty of the secondary task. In comparison with the single task, reaction time was delayed and the ERN amplitude decreased in the primary task as the secondary task difficulty increased in the dual task. This suggests that the error detection process in the primary task may diminish when the secondary task requires more perceptual resource. In conclusion, the reduced perceptual resource influenced the error detection process for the primary task revealing the reduced ERN.
