5.15 - Learning and Memory

Question 1

Define learning

Answer 1

The combined effect of encoding, storage, and retrieval of experiences.

Question 2

What is (and is not) the role of the hippocampus in memory?

Answer 2

1. Crucial for the acquisition of new declarative memories
2. Not necessary for the formation of non-declarative and procedural memories.
3. Not necessary for short term memory

Question 3

What is habituation?

Answer 3

Diminished neuronal firing in response to a repeated (uninteresting) stimulus

Question 4

What is sensitization?

Answer 4

A form of non-associative learning that leads to a progressive increase in neuronal activity in response to a repeatedly presented stimulus

Question 5

A patient learns how to ride a bicycle after several days of training. However, she can not recall ever having learned to do so.

Which type of memory is impaired in this patient? Which type of memory is intact?

Answer 5

Declarative memory is impaired

Procedural memory is intact

Question 6

Hodgkin recalls the time he first met Huxley.

Which type of memory does he experience?

Answer 6

Episodic memory

Question 7

Classical conditioning is a type of _____ learning.

Answer 7

associative

Question 8

Is the memory formed by classical conditioning implicit or explicit?

Answer 8

Implicit

Question 9

Which direction does the information flow between the hippocampus and the association cortices?

Answer 9

The information flows bi-directionally:

Projections from the association cortices converge onto the hippocampus. There the information gets consolidated and is sent back to the association cortices.

Question 10

Memory is thought to be consolidated in …

Answer 10

…the cortex

Question 11

What is the main difference between standard consolidation theory and multiple trace theory of consolidation?

Answer 11

Standard consolidation theory states that after the memories are consolidated in the hippocampus, they are transferred to the cortex and become independent of the hippocampus.

Multiple trace theory states that the hippocampus is always involved in retrieval and storage, which are encoded in a unique trace upon every presentation.

Question 12

Watermaze is used to study _____ in mice.

Answer 12

spatial memory / navigation

Question 13

In a watermaze experiment, how does the mouse initially find a platform?

Answer 13

Through random exploration/detection

Question 14

What are place cells?

Answer 14

Cells within the hippocampus that have invariant response to specific location (place field) within the open field.

Image source: Latuske et al., 2018

Question 15

What is the function of grid cells and where can we find them in the brain?

Answer 15

We can find grid cells in the entorhinal cortex in the hippocampus

They are involved in coding for the position in space.

Question 16

What is an engram?

Answer 16

A unit of cognitive information inside the brain theorized to be the means by which memories are stored as biophysical and biochemical changes in the brain.

Question 17

What is the goal of eye-blink conditioning?

Answer 17

It is a paradigm for associative learning of a motor response to a stimulus. Temporal learning.

Time between stimulus and response has to be short (tens to hundreds of miliseconds) for it to be learnable.

Question 18

What psychological variables can we affect memory formation?

Answer 18

(1) Emotion
(2) Attention
(3) Relevance
(4) Context
(5) Repetition