Fein et al. studied a different aspect of performance monitoring in treatment naïve alcoholics using the balloon analogue risk task (BART) (Fein and Chang 2008). Instead of examining the ERN, which occurs following a response as done in the present study, Fein and colleagues focused their analysis on the feedback-ERN (F-ERN). The F-ERN is elicited by tasks in which subjects use positive and negative feedback to evaluate their responses and occurs approximately 250 ms following the feedback stimuli (Holroyd et al. 2004; Nieuwenhuis et al. 2004; Hajcak et al. 2006). They found that smaller F-ERN amplitudes were associated with a greater family history density of alcohol problems. Nonetheless, F-ERN amplitudes were not related to performance or the amount of money lost on the BART. Their results suggest that genetic vulnerability toward developing alcoholism may be related to decreased sensitivity to negative feedback. The fact that these findings appear to point to a deficit in performance monitoring in alcoholics is at first glance in opposition to our findings; however, it has been argued that the ERN and F-ERN do not represent
