Memory defintions Flashcards
Declarative memory
Memory that can be verbally expressed.
Confabulation
The reporting of memories of events that did not take place, without the intention to deceive.
Seen in people with Korsakoff’s syndrome and Clive Wearing case study.
AP5
A drug that blocks NMDA receptors
2-amino-5-phosphonopentanoate
Long term potentiation
Long term increase in the excitability of a neurone to a particular synaptic input.
- Caused by repeated high-frequency activity of that input.
Entorhinal cortex
Part of the limbic system that provides the major source of input to hippocampal formation.
Hebb’s rule
Hypothesis that the cellular basis of learning involves the strengthening of a synapse that is repeatedly active when the postsynaptic neurone fires
Long term depression
Long term decrease in the excitability of a neurone to a particular synaptic input
- Caused by stimulation [repeated sub-threshold potentials from low frequency stimulation] of the terminal button
- While the post-synaptic membrane is hyperpolarised of only slightly depolarised.
Short term memory
Memory of a stimulus or event that lasts for a short term.
Non-declarative memory
Formation does not depend on the hippocampus.
Perceptual, stimulus response and motor memory
This was intact in the study of HM
Semantic dementia
Loss of semantic memory caused by progressive degeneration of the frontal neocortex and lateral temporal lobes
Korsakoff’s syndrome
Permanent anterograde amnesia caused by brain damage from chronic alcoholism or malnutrition.
Working memory
Temporary form of information storage that is limited in capacity and requires rehearsal.
Multiple temporary storage areas in the cerebral cortex.
