5-learning and memory Flashcards
What is learning, and how does it affect behavior?
Learning is the acquisition of info, which can improve adaptive behavior as it allows future behavior to be modified. It’s facilitated by REM sleep, which is where long-term potentiation happens. This is where there is a persistent increase of the synaptic response to a given stimulus. Since learning doesn’t immediately go long-term, the memory needs to be consolidated, which can take hours. It only takes place when there’s a prediction error.
Describe the different types of visual memory.
Immediate: ‘iconic’ memory that lasts up to 1 second; likely to result from brief after-images in the sensory neurons of the retinal surface of the eye.
Short-term: retention of info over a period of minutes to hours; supported by temporal cortex.
Working memory: short-term store of info in an online state for current processing and use.
Long-term: retention of info over a period of greater than 24 hours and up to a lifetime. requires the peripheral and para-hippocampal cortices. Ex: if someone has trauma inflicted on his or her hippocampus, but not on the cerebellum (responsible for functioning motor movement and memories), they can still do some stuff like—if they’re being taught to draw every day, they will get better. Even if they don’t remember it.
Describe conscious memory and the types.
Explicit/declarative memory are memories that we’re fully aware of. Type: episodic and semantic. Episodic is a recollection of events that we’ve experienced, with details of time and place; thalamus. Damaged if the hippocampus is damaged. Semantic is knowledge of facts; cortex. Ex: You know facts about the moon, but have never actually been to the moon before.
Describe the theory of system consolidation.
The theory describes the transfer of dependence of old memories to the cortex. For example, the information the professor is relaying to a student in a class is being translated by his or her hippocampus. This is so later on, when that student starts to get more familiar with that info, they can start to consolidate the knowledge, with the help of the hippocampus, into the cortex. Since episodic memories rely upon binding together different cortical areas, and the hippocampus can do this quickly, it’s necessary initially to retrieve those episodic memories. But when the cortical areas are linked together directly, meaning that that info is consolidated into the cortex, you wouldn’t need the hippocampus’ help anymore. Therefore, the hippocampus is no longer essential for memory retrieval.
Compare the different kinds of amnesia: retrograde, graded, and anterograde. Next, what kind of memories remain intact in amnesiacs?
Retrograde: for events prior to the trauma.
Anterograde: unable to form new memories.
Graded: memory for recent events is more fragile than for remote events.
Describe the multiple-trace model of consolidation.
Believes that the hippocampus continues to play a role, well beyond consolidation in the cortex. Therefore, the hippocampus is active during retrieval for both new and old episodic memories.
What is memory processed by?
The hippocampus, it’s strongly associated with conscious, episodic memory and spatial memory. damage could ruin these memories, plus previously acquired memories.
Describe the difference between semantic and implicit memory.
Semantic: I ask, who is Sigmund Freud, and you say that he’s important in the field of psychoanalysis. Implicit: You learn a language when you were super young and you start to lose it as you get older. However, you take a class in high school to learn that language. Compared to someone who has had no experience in the language at all, you will pick up things faster than that person in that class.
Describe unconscious memories and the types.
Unconscious/non-declarative memory: memories that we are unware of; includes Pavlovian conditioning, perceptual and procedural learning.
Perceptual: perceptual info, such as visual memory. integral aspect is that learning and memory is associated with stimulus exposure, which leads to recognition of that stimulus at a later time. this is fundamental to all aspects of learning and behavior in general. Ex: remembering a relative’s face.
Procedural: procedures or skills. Ex: touch-typing on a keyboard. sequence of finger movements require find control over the muscles, so the more we practice, we’ll be faster and more accurate. Main organ: cerebellum, which is important for learning and coordinating complex movements.
Describe the role of the amygdala and memory/emotions.
It’s a brain area within the temporal lobe; involved in Pavlovian conditioning and emotional processing, especially fear. Brain imaging (correlative evidence) and lesions and other in-activations (causational evidence) for the amygdala being involved in fear conditioning.
Describe the Rescorla-Wagner rule.
First, the amount that you learn appears to be regulated by the level of surprise at the occurrence of an event. The more surprising, the less able you were to predict it, and so the more you should update your memory.
Describe memory.
These can persist for different lengths of time and localized to different areas in the brain. It can likely be supported by synaptic plasticity. These also enable the prediction of future events, such that behavior can be modified accordingly.
Describe cellular consolidation.
It’s time-dependent stabilization of an acquired memory. It takes a few hours and requires the synthesis of new proteins.
