N200 and P300 as orthogonal and integrable indicators of distinct awareness and recognition processes in memory detection

Abstract In an event‐related potential ( ERP )‐based concealed information test ( CIT ), we investigated the effect of manipulated awareness of concealed information on the ERPs . Participants either committed a mock crime or not (guilty vs. innocent) before the CIT , and received feedback regarding either specific (high awareness) or general (low awareness) task performance during the CIT . We found that awareness and recognition of the crime‐relevant information differentially influenced the frontal‐central N 200 and parietal P 300: Probe elicited a larger N 200 than irrelevant only when guilty participants were in the high awareness condition, whereas the P 300 was mainly responsive to information recognition. No N 200‐ P 300 correlation was found, allowing for a combined measure of both yielding the highest detection efficiency in the high awareness group ( AUC = .91). Finally, a color‐naming Stroop task following the CIT revealed that guilty participants showed larger interference effects than innocent participants, suggesting that the former expended more attentional resources during the CIT .