Interplay of Anticipatory Curiosity and Reactive Surprise drive epistemic motivation and lasting memory updating
Abstract
The need to correct erroneous beliefs is inevitable, especially in a world where information propagates faster than it can be verified. However, passive exposure to corrections is often inadequate for memory updating. Prospective motivational states like curiosity and error-evoked signals like surprise have each been shown to motivate learning and influence memory, yet how they interact to shape information-seeking and memory updating remains unknown. Here, we demonstrate that anticipatory curiosity and post-error surprise serve as distinct, compensatory drivers of epistemic motivation and memory updating. Using a paradigm designed to evoke high-confidence errors, we assessed curiosity, surprise, information seeking, and memory updating in participants who were tested either immediately or after a 24-hour delay. We found that while memory updating tested after 24 hours was weaker (relative to immediate testing), active information-seeking protected updated memories from decay. Crucially, when initial curiosity was low, post-error surprise acted as a compensatory trigger to increase information-seeking and durable memory updating. Mediation analyses showed that error-evoked epistemic signals enhanced durable memory updating both directly and indirectly by promoting information-seeking decisions. These findings highlight that when curiosity is lacking, evoking salient errors can promote both active information-seeking and durable memory updating necessary for correcting…
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