Week 9: Learning and Memory Flashcards
What are the 3 types of memory?
Sensory Memory (<1 sec)
Short-Term Memory (Working Memory) <1 min
Long-Term Memory (lifetime)
All information enters ____ memory before it is consolidated into ____ memory.
short-term
long-term
Long term memory can be classified into which 2 types of memory?
- Explicit memory (conscious)
- Implicit memory (unconscious)
What is a type of implicit memory?
Procedural memory (skills and tasks)
What is a type of explicit memory?
Declarative memory (facts, events)
- Episodic memory (personal experiences)
- Semantic memory (facts, concepts)
What is priming?
An implicit memory effect in which exposure to one stimulus (ie. perceptual pattern) influences the response to another stimulus.
What does classical conditioning involve? What kind of behaviour does it focus on?
Involves placing a neutral signal before a reflex
Focuses on involuntary automatic behaviours (reflexes)
Describe the steps of classical conditioning.
Conditioned stimulus (CS) (eg. bell) → food (UCS) → unconditioned response (UCR) (eg. salivation)
After some repetitions,
CS → Conditioned Response (CR) (eg. salivation)
Form of very basic learning
Was revolutionary at that time because it helped us
understand memory in a scientific way
What does operant conditioning involve? What kind of behaviour does it focus on?
Involves applying a reward or punishment after a behaviour.
Focuses on strengthening or weakening voluntary behaviours
What is an engram?
Engram refers to the physical representation of what has been learned
Which location in the brain explains the neural basis of classical conditioning? Which paradigm is used to test the location of learning?
Cerebellum. Eye-blinking paradigm. Rabbit wears headgear; puff of air to eye causes eye to blink. Pair air puff with tone, after many repetitions, tone alone comes to elicit a blink.
Name the sequence of synapses and pathways in classical conditioning (implicit learning).
sensory input –> Lateral Interpositus nucleus of cerebellum (LIP) –> Red nucleus (motor nucleus) –> Sixth Cranial Nerve –> motor output
Where is the location of learning in the cerebellum?
In the synapse between the LIP and red nucleus.
If the delay between the conditioned stimulus (eg. bell) and unconditioned stimulus (eg. food) is longer than 2 seconds, which other brain structure is responsible for learning?
Basal Ganglia.
If you temporarily block the pathways from sensory input to location of learning, what will occur?
No learning, no conditioned response
If you temporarily block the pathways after the location of learning to the motor output, what will occur?
Learning, but no conditioned response
Briefly describe the weather prediction task.
All participants (with or without basal ganglia damage) will be able to figure out the obvious association between certain cards with the weather, they followed these associations and can achieve 75% accuracy in prediction. However, for people who have basal ganglia impairment, even though they are able to form the initial rule for the more obvious associations (i.e. triangles then rain), they are unable to perform beyond that. Suggests their deficit in forming implicit memories.
What does the weather prediction task show?
Show that basal ganglia is involved in implicit memory
What disease is associated with basal ganglia impairment?
Parkinson’s disease
To prevent epileptic attacks, which brain structure was removed in patient H.M?
Hippocampus; parahippocampal areas
What was patient H.M’s behaviour like after the removal of hippocampus?
He does not consciously remember the researchers but has some subconscious record of the experiences based on habits, interactions, and emotions. Impaired declarative memory, especially episodic memory.
What kind of learning and memory is the hippocampus possibly involved in?
1) Explicit learning
2) spatial memory (could play a role in creating cognitive or temporal maps)
3) transit working memory to long-term memory
What are the 3 other effects of hippocampal removal?
1) Anterograde amnesia – inability to form memories after the brain damage
2) Retrograde amnesia – loss of memories for events before the brain damage, especially more recent events closer to the brain damage.
3) intact working memory
What are the 2 types of cells in the hippocampus?
1) place cell - active as long as rat passes by the area that it responds to
2) grid cell - similar to place cells, but areas are regularly spaced
What does the idea of hebbian synapses propose?
Proposed that if an axon has successfully stimulated another cell in the past, it becomes more successful in the future.
What is sensitisation?
After a strong stimulus, a subsequent mild stimulus evokes a strong reflex
What is habituation?
After a mild stimulus, a subsequent mild stimulus evokes a weaker reflex.
What happens at the synapse during habituation?
Decreased release of neurotransmitter into the synapse
What happens at the synapse during sensitization?
Increased release of neurotransmitter into synapse (note: number of action potentials does not change)
Besides the hippocampus, what other regions are involved in explicit memory? (4)
1) Parietal cortex - linking one memory to another
2) Amygdala - fear memories
3) medial prefrontal cortex - learning about rewards and punishments
4) anterior temporal lobe - semantic dementia (not knowing what a zebra is)
Comparing the basal ganglia and the cerebellum, how many trials are needed for learning?
Basal ganglia - integrates information over many trials
Cerebellum - can learn in a single trial
What is the difference in type of feedback required by the basal ganglia and the cerebellum for learning?
basal ganglia - need immediate feedback (reward, punishment)
Cerebellum - can learn from delayed feedback
What is the difference between sensatisation and LTP?
Sensitisation – increased release in neurotransmitters at the synapse
LTP – increased strength of synapse over time
Sensitization may or may not lead to LTP.
What are the 3 properties of LTP?
1) Specificity - only active synapses will be strengthened
2) Cooperativity - simultaneous stimulation by 2 or more axons produces LTP more strongly than having repeated stimulation for just 1 axon
3) Associativity - Pairing a weak input with a strong input enhances later response to the weak input.
