Table 1.

Behavioral and neuroscientific studies examining age differences in performance monitoring.

Study	Method	Age groups	Motivational influence	Paradigm	Main results
Gorlick et al., 2013	Behavioral	18–35 and 60–82 years	Cognitive feedback (point gain vs. point loss) vs. social feedback (happy vs. angry faces)	Rule learning and set shifting via feedback	Experiment 1 (face feedback): • Minimal load on cognitive control: happy-face feedback attenuated age-related deficits in initial rule learning and angry-face feedback led to age-related deficits in initial rule learning and set shifting
					• High load on cognitive control: angry-face feedback attenuated age-related deficits in initial rule learning and set shifting whereas happy-face feedback led to age-related deficits in initial rule learning and set shifting
					Experiment 2 (point feedback): • Age-related deficits in initial rule learning and set shifting under low and high cognitive load for point-gain and point-loss conditions
Kardos et al., 2016a	ERPs	21–28 and 62–72 years	Points accumulated during experiment are added to participation fee	Balloon Analog Risk Task	• In young, reward positivity increased as function of reward contingencies with largest amplitude for rewarding feedback followed by the decision to stop
					• Older adults characterized by hesitation and more deliberative decision making, reward positivity did not reflect the effect of reward structure
Kardos et al., 2016b	ERPs	18–32 and	Two amounts of monetary	Gambling task	• Riskier choices after negative feedback
		62–72 years	gains/losses		• In young adults, FRN was indicator of goodness of outcome (loss or gain), P3 showed a complex picture of feedback evaluation with selective sensitivity to large amount of gains
					• In older adults, outcome valence had no effect on FRN, P3 was insensitive of the complex outcome properties
Nashiro et al., 2011	Behavioral	Exp 1: 18–25 and 62–83 years Exp 2: 18–24 and 69–93 years Exp 3: 18–26 years	Angry and happy faces as feedback vs. more or less points	Learning and set shifting task	• Older adults made more errors than younger adults in the angry face feedback condition, but no age differences in happy face feedback condition