Learning and memory part 1

Question 1

What is implicit memory?

Answer 1

Unconscious memory: e.g., a skill or conditioned
response –> cannot verbally declare

Question 2

What is priming for implicit memory?

Answer 2

Using a stimulus to sensitize the nervous
system to a later presentation of the same or a
similar stimulus;

Question 3

What is explicit memory?

Answer 3

Conscious memory: Subjects can retrieve an item
and indicate that they know they retrieved the
correct item

Question 4

What are the two types of explicit memory?

Answer 4

Semantic (facts) or episodic (events)

Question 5

What is usually preserved in amnesia?

Answer 5

Implicit memory

Question 6

What are two implicit learning memory tasks?

Answer 6

Gollin Figure test and Pursuit Rotor task

Question 7

Describe the Gollin figure test? What do amnesics show?

Answer 7

tests Implicit Visual Learning
Identify degraded image
On a retention test,
participants identify
image sooner,
indicating some form of
memory.
* Similar findings in
amnesic patients

Question 8

Describe the pursuit rotor task. What do amnesics show?

Answer 8

Implicit Motor-Skills Learning
Follow a moving target with a stylus
Presented with the same task
a week later, both controls
and amnesics take less time to
perform it.

Question 9

Describe Patient J.K’s impairment.

Answer 9

Impaired implicit memory with intact explicit memory
* Developed Parkinson disease in his mid 70s and started to have memory problems at 78
* Damage to basal ganglia

Question 10

What could patient J.K do and what would he not do? Give an example

Answer 10

Impaired ability to perform tasks that he had done all his life
* Could still recall explicit events
Knows something is a remote but can’t use it

Question 11

Name 4 tests of explicit memory.

Answer 11

Verbal recall: word lists
* Visual recall: complex figures –> Rey-Osterrieth Complex figure
* Spatial recall: navigation paradigms
* Contextual recall: recall of stories

Question 12

What are other words for implicit and explicit memory?

Answer 12

procedural and declarative memory

Question 13

What is declarative memory?

Answer 13

Ability to recount
what one knows, to detail the time,
place, and circumstances of events

Question 14

What is procedural memory?

Answer 14

Ability to recall a
movement sequence or how to perform
some act or behavior

Question 15

How are memories encoded differently for explicit and implicit memories?

Answer 15

Implicit information encoded in a bottom-up, or data-driven, manner
Explicit information encoded in a top-down, or conceptually driven,
manner.

Question 16

How would this be encoded for explicit and implicit?

Answer 16

Implicit –> it would just be lines
Explicit –> context would influence it

Question 17

How long is considered short term memory?

Answer 17

few minutes

Question 18

What structures are involved in short term memory?

Answer 18

Frontal lobes

Question 19

What structures are involved in long term memory?

Answer 19

the temporal lobe

Question 20

Where does memory storage occur?

Answer 20

Across the entire cortex

Question 21

What areas are involved in processing semantic info?

Answer 21

default mode network

Question 22

What area is involved in classical conditioning?

Answer 22

amygdala

Question 23

What is a more specific definition of episodic memory?

Answer 23

Autobiographical memory for events pegged to specific
place and time contexts

Question 24

What areas are involved in episodic memories?

Answer 24

VmPFC and hippocampus

Question 25

What does the VmPFC and hippocampus do for memory?

Answer 25

hippocampus involved in searching for and accessing specific life episodes VmPFC involved in reassembling vivid episodic elements

Question 26

What did the study on episodic memory and medial temporal lobe epilepsy show?

Answer 26

Poor episodic recall reduced hippocampal activity Increased VmPFC activity VmPFC trying to compensate for decreased hippocampus activity

Question 27

What did patient K.C have? What were their brain impairments?

Answer 27

Episodic amnesia Severe anterograde amnesia; bilateral hippocampus damage + left frontal damage (reduced blood flow to PFC)

Question 28

What were the effects of episodic amnesia on patient K.C?

Answer 28

Could recall past memory (semantic) but was unable to recall any personal experience likely due to PFC damage Could not think of self in the future

Question 29

What do frontal lobes do for episodic memories?

Answer 29

allow us to mentally travel through our past/ think about self in future

Question 30

What is Highly superior autobiographical memory (HSAM)?

Answer 30

People display virtually complete recall for events in their lives, usually beginning around age 10. Superior episodic memory but not superior cognitive ability

Question 31

What are the brain correlates of HSAM?

Answer 31

Increased gray matter in the temporal and parietal lobes; increased size in the fiber projection between the temporal and frontal lobes

Question 32

What surgery was performed on H.M and why?

Answer 32

a bilateral medial temporal lobe resection (part of amygdala removed) Seizures originated in the region of the amygdala, hippocampal formation, and associated subcortical structures, so Scoville removed them bilaterally

Question 33

What were the results of H.M's surgery?

Answer 33

severe anterograde amnesia, lacking any explicit memory H. M. had an above-average IQ, performed well on perceptual tests, and could recall events from his childhood --> H. M.’s implicit memory was intact

Question 34

What are the two main regions involved in explicit memory?

Answer 34

Medial temporal region Frontal cortex

Question 35

What are the five regions of the MT region? Which ones are part of the hippocampal formation?

Answer 35

Hippocampus * Entorhinal cortex * Parahippocampal cortex * Perirhinal cortex * Amygdala Everything but the amygdala are apart of the hippocampal formation

Question 36

Describe the connections for the parahippocampal cortex, perirhinal cortex, Enthorhinal cortex

Answer 36

Parahippocampal receives connections from parietal cortex Perirhinal cortex receives connections from visual areas of ventral stream Entorhinal cortex receives projections from parahippocampal and perirhinal cortices --> integrative function

Question 37

What does the parahippocampal cortex do?

Answer 37

spatial memory

Question 38

What does the perirhinal cortex do?

Answer 38

Object recognition, sense of familiarity, binds things like colour and appearance of objects

Question 39

What does the entorhinal cortex do?

Answer 39

Integrative function --> binds info about where something is and what it is

Question 40

What is the first area to show cell death in alzheimers?

Answer 40

Entorhinal cortex

Question 41

What does the hippocampus do?

Answer 41

Hippocampus involved in encoding and consolidating new memories.

Question 42

What happens to memories during consolidation?

Answer 42

During consolidation, memories move from hippocampus to diffuse regions in the neocortex Once memories move, hippocampal involvement is no longer needed

Question 43

What happens when a memory is relayed in the mind?

Answer 43

It is open to further consolidation (reconsolidation) --> hippocampus involved again

Question 44

How can reconsolidation be used?

Answer 44

making traumatic memories neutral in PTSD treatment

Question 45

What else is the hippocampus involved in?

Answer 45

visuospatial memory

Question 46

What happens if you damage the hippocampus?

Answer 46

Severe deficits in spatial memory - difficulty learning the location of objects

Question 47

What do animals/humans who have more spatial memory show?

Answer 47

Bigger hippocampus

Question 48

Describe the task that tested damage to the Perirhinal cortex?

Answer 48

Monkey is trained to displace an object to obtain a food reward Then shown two objects and it had to displace the new object to get reward Can't do this because it has issues with object recognition

Question 49

Describe the task that tested damage to the hippocampus cortex?

Answer 49

The monkey is shown one object to displace for a food reward. On the next trial, the monkey is shown two identical objects and must choose the one in the same location as in the initial presentation Can't do this cause they can't remember spatial location

Question 50

What are the three types of spatial cells in the rat hippocampus?

Answer 50

Place cells Head direction cells Grid cells

Question 51

What are place cells?

Answer 51

Discharge when rats are in a spatial location, irrespective of orientation (tells us where things are in the world) --> different cognitive map for each place

Question 52

What are head direction cells?

Answer 52

discharge whenever a rat’s head points in a particular direction (tells us where we are in the environment)

Question 53

What are grid cells?

Answer 53

discharge at many locations, forming a virtual grid irrespective of rat’s direction, movement, or speed (tells us how big our current environment is and where we are in the environment

Question 54

What are the reciprocal connections for explicit memory between?

Answer 54

temporal lobe structures and neocortex

Question 55

What does the hippocampus bind?

Answer 55

Time and place for explicit memories

Question 56

What are the benefits of reciprocal connections for explicit memory?

Answer 56

Signals from MTL to cortical sensory regions keep sensory experience alive in the brain: neural activity outlasts the actual experience. Pathway back to the neocortex means it is kept apprised of the information being processed in medial temporal regions --> tells you what to refocus on

Question 57

Besides with explicit memory, what else is the frontal lobe involved in?

Answer 57

Short-term memory

Question 58

What do people with frontal lobe damage show?

Answer 58

often have amnesia (can't form explicit memory), but it manifests differently.

Question 59

What do patients with frontal lobe amnesia show?

Answer 59

can recall events, but * Have difficulty recalling the temporal order of events * Have difficulty holding new information “online” for extended periods (impaired short-term memory) --> to make a decision you have to hold it in the mind for a couple minutes

Question 60

Describe the monkey task on the frontal lobe and STM. What are the three tasks?

Answer 60

Monkeys shown lights in an array – Must maintain aspects of the lights in STM over a delay for reward Delayed response-task: must choose light that is in the same location as the cue Delayed alternation task: must choose light that is not in the same location as the cue Delayed-matching to sample task: Must choose light that is the same colour as the cue -

Question 61

What were the findings of the monkey frontal lobe and short term memory study

Answer 61

Certain cells in frontal cortex fire throughout the delay Animals that have not learned the task show no such cell activity Trained animals that make an error show activity that corresponds to the error --> can predict what they will do

Question 62

What is Korsakoff syndrome

Answer 62

Amnestic disorder caused by diencephalic damage (medial thalamus) from chronic alcoholism or malnutrition that produces a vitamin B1 deficiency

Question 63

What are the symptoms of Korsakoff's syndrome?

Answer 63

Confabulation --> fabrication of new memories (other amnesics don't do this) * Loss of the ability to learn new information (anterograde amnesia) * Loss of ability to retrieve old information (retrograde amnesia)

Question 64

What suggests that Korsakoff's syndrome is involved in explicit memory?

Answer 64

selective damage of medial thalamus i