Open your eyes for prediction errors

Previous studies have demonstrated that autonomic arousal is increased following correct task performance on a difficult, relative to an easy, task. Here, we hypothesized that this arousal response reflects the (relative) surprise of correct performance following a difficult versus an easy task. Following this line of reasoning, we would expect to find a reversed pattern following erroneous responses, because errors are less expected during an easy than during a difficult task. To test this, participants performed a flanker task while pupil size was measured online. As predicted, the results demonstrated that pupil size was larger following difficult (incongruent) correct trials than following easy (congruent) correct trials, but smaller following difficult than following easy incorrect trials. Moreover, participants with larger congruency effects, and hence a larger difference in outcome expectancies between the two trial types, showed larger differences in pupil size after both correct and incorrect responses, further corroborating the idea that pupil size increased as a measure of performance prediction errors.