Abstract
Numerous event-related potential (ERP) studies have established a link between the concept of self and a P300 component, and there is robust evidence from functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) showing self-referential memory effects during encoding through the subsequent memory paradigm. The purpose of the present study was to investigate how self and other-referential information differ at encoding using ERP. It was hypothesized that the encoding of self-referential information would produce a P300 component to a greater extent than other-referential information. Participants were cued to evaluate either self or other by a descriptive adjective by making a yes/no key press during ERP recording. Contrary to expected results, it was found that the self and other-referent conditions did not differ from one another and both elicited equivalent P300 responses. This suggests that P300 modulates and orients attention, and indicates that perhaps differential encoding of self and other occurs at a different ERP component.