Rolf Degen summarizing... Our memory helps preserve a rosy view, wiping out inconvenient truths about ourselves

Optimistic Amnesia: How Online and Offline Processing Shape Belief Updating and Memory Biases in Immediate and Long-Term Optimism Biases. Ziqing Yao, Xuanyi Lin, Xiaoqing Hu. Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, nsab011, January 27 2021. https://doi.org/10.1093/scan/nsab011

Rolf Degen's take: Our memory helps preserve a rosy view, wiping out inconvenient truths about ourselves. https://t.co/Xn0TYMNLZs https://t.co/OqSl8sKCdP

Abstract: When people are confronted with feedback that counters their prior beliefs, they preferentially rely on desirable rather than undesirable feedback in belief updating, i.e., an optimism bias. In two pre-registered EEG studies employing an adverse life event probability estimation task, we investigated the neurocognitive processes that support the formation and the change of optimism biases in immediate and 24-hour delayed tests. We found that optimistic belief updating biases not only emerged immediately, but also became significantly larger after 24 hours, suggesting an active role of valence-dependent offline consolidation processes in the change of optimism biases. Participants also showed optimistic memory biases: they were less accurate in remembering undesirable than desirable feedback probabilities, with inferior memories of undesirable feedback associated with lower belief updating in the delayed test. Examining event-related brain potentials (ERPs) revealed that desirability of feedback biased initial encoding: desirable feedback elicited larger P300s than undesirable feedback, with larger P300 amplitudes predicting both higher belief updating and memory accuracies. These results suggest that desirability of feedback could bias both online and offline memory-related processes such as encoding and consolidation, with both processes contributing to the formation and change of optimism biases.

Keywords: optimism bias, belief updating, offline processing, P300, motivated cognition

Discussion

Encountering feedback that challenges one’s prior beliefs, people preferentially rely on desirable

than undesirable feedback to guide belief updating, i.e., the optimism bias (Dricu et al., 2020;

Sharot & Garrett, 2016; Sharot et al., 2011). Here, we provide novel evidence that optimism

biases are partially driven by shallower encoding and inferior memories of undesirable versus

desirable feedback, i.e., an optimistic amnesia effect. Moreover, we observed that optimistic

updating biases became larger over time, with preferential retention of updating in the desirable

condition and declined updating in the undesirable condition. Desirability of feedback

consistently modulated parietal P300 brain activities that may indicate encoding depth, with

larger P300s for desirable than undesirable probability feedback.

The present research provides the first evidence that optimism biases become larger over

24 hours. This finding is noteworthy because it suggests that the desirability of feedback not only

influences online attention/encoding-related processes but also biases offline consolidation

processes. A closer inspection of our data suggested that over time, belief updating, and

memories of desirable feedback were largely preserved, whereas updating and memories

significantly declined for undesirable feedback. These findings contribute to a growing literature

suggesting that motivation (e.g., valence, reward) could bias offline consolidation processes and

then influence long-term judgments (Payne & Kensinger, 2018; Rasch & Born, 2013; Stickgold

& Walker, 2013).

Our findings that belief updating and memories changed more significantly in the

undesirable but not in the desirable condition provide additional evidence that optimism bias is

primarily driven by insufficient updating when receiving undesirable feedback (Eil & Rao, 2011;

Sharot et al., 2011). Prior research found that self-related undesirable updating was not only

lower than self-related desirable updating but also lower than other-related updating in general

(Kuzmanovic et al., 2016). Moreover, aging participants showed reduced belief updating

following undesirable feedback compared to young adults, leading to larger optimism biases

(Chowdhury et al., 2014). In contrast, patients with major depressive disorder or individuals with

high functioning autism showed enhanced belief updating toward undesirable feedback relative to

healthy controls, leading to smaller optimism biases (Garrett et al., 2014; Korn et al., 2014;

Kuzmanovic et al., 2019). These findings, together with our novel results on delayed belief

updating and memory biases, consistently suggest that insufficient updating in response to

undesirable feedback is a fundamental mechanism that drives immediate and long-term optimism

biases.

Tracking ERPs allows us to investigate how the desirability of feedback biases

information processing along millisecond temporal scale. We found that the desirability of

feedback significantly modulated P300, and to a less extent, the LPP, but not the FRN. As one of

the most investigated ERP components, P300 has been associated with a range of cognitive

processes, including context updating, motivational salience, evaluation and categorization,

encoding depth, etc. (Azizian & Polich, 2007; Polich, 2007, 2012). In the present study, enhanced

parietal P300s to desirable versus undesirable feedback suggested that participants preferentially

encoded desirable feedback, which then exerted a greater impact on subsequent belief updating

and memory performance. Regarding the LPP effect, prior research suggested that LPP may

reflect in-depth elaboration of motivationally salient stimuli (Hajcak & Foti, 2020). Indeed,

multilevel analyses with trial-level data showed that enhanced P300 and LPPs to feedback

predicted larger belief updating and more accurate memories of feedback probabilities,

substantiating the putative role of the P300/LPP in encoding and elaboration processes (Kamp et

al., 2015; Otten & Donchin, 2000; Otten & Rugg, 2001; Rigney et al., 2020). These ERPs results

also suggest that differential processing of desirable and undesirable feedback can occur rapidly

after the initial valence processing.

We hypothesized that the frontocentral FRN would encode the desirability of feedback,

with larger FRNs elicited by undesirable versus desirable feedback (Heydari & Holroyd, 2016;

Yeung & Sanfey, 2004). However, the desirability of feedback was not observed to modulate

FRN. The insensitivity of FRN to feedback valence in the belief updating task raises the

possibility that estimation errors and reward prediction errors could reflect distinctive

computational processes of error tracking (Sharot & Garrett, 2016). Specifically, FRNs are

typically observed in reward processing tasks during which feedback conveys monetary gains and

losses (Hajcak et al., 2006; Heydari & Holroyd, 2016; Proudfit, 2015), whereas feedback in our

task indicated numerical discrepancies between estimations of probabilities. Specifically,

participants in the belief updating task needed to calculate the discrepancies between feedback

probabilities and their initial estimations to guide belief updating. Such high-level inferential and

calculation processes might make FRNs insensitive to the desirability of feedback in the present

context. Moreover, FRNs have been suggested to be involved in both error tracking and

behavioral adjustment. For example, in reward tasks, FRNs elicited by undesirable feedback (e.g.,

a loss) could guide behavioral adjustment to avoid losses (Cohen et al., 2007; Holroyd & Coles,

2002; Hu et al., 2015; Walsh & Anderson, 2012). However, in our belief updating task,

participants preferentially used desirable rather than undesirable feedback to guide belief

updating. The FRNs may reflect complex motivational-cognitive processes including both error

tracking (in response to both desirable and undesirable feedback), and the signaling of behavioral

adjustment (i.e., in response to desirable feedback). A mixture of these motivational-cognitive

processes may thus lead to comparable FRNs in both desirable and undesirable conditions.

Regarding the delayed optimism biases, although our results suggest that time delay and

offline processes contributed to the enhancement of optimism biases, it remains unknown

whether sleep or wakefulness may differentially influence belief updating and memory biases. On

the one hand, enhancement of optimism biases may be time-dependent rather than sleepdependent. Alternatively, given that sleep plays an important role in memory consolidation

(Rasch & Born, 2013), sleep-based consolidation may be necessary for optimism biases to

change. Future studies shall directly link sleep, offline consolidation processes, and optimism

biases to test this novel hypothesis.