Divide and Conquer: How Perceived Reference Axes Help Maintain Memory for Locations

分而治之：感知参考轴如何帮助维持位置记忆

• 批准号: 0091757
• 负责人: John Spencer
• 金额: $ 30.37万
• 依托单位: University of Iowa
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Continuing Grant
• 财政年份: 2001
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2001-09-01 至 2004-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0091757&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Divide; Conquer; How; Perceived; Reference

To interact successfully in the environment, people must remember the locations of important objects accurately enough to find these objects when they are no longer in view. Otherwise, keys, shoes, and hats would be lost forever in the clutter of the typical home or office. The majority of research investigating the characteristics of location memory has focused on WHAT people represent in memory. For instance, do people represent that a set of keys is two inches to the left of a computer, or do they represent that the keys are one arms-length away? Although what is represented is a fundamental question, this research will examine a different, but equally important question: HOW do people maintain location information in memory? This question is timely because recent studies with non-human primates have identified several brain regions that contribute to the maintenance of location information in memory. Thus, there is a growing understanding of how the brain keeps location information active in memory. Nevertheless, few studies with humans have interfaced with this emerging knowledge base. This research will establish a link between behavioral studies of how humans remember locations and the literature on brain function. Central to this research is how people use perceptual cues from second-to-second to help maintain information in memory. Evidence from a variety of studies suggests that people rely on visible reference axes, e.g., the edges of a table, the edges of a computer screen, to help them remember the locations of target objects. Use of such perceptual cues can help keep remembered information in the right ballpark (the keys are near the left edge of the table and not over by the computer). Nevertheless, there is a cost, in that memory is systematically distorted near reference axes. Specifically, when people are asked to reproduce the location of a hidden object, they exaggerate the distance between the reference axis and the actual location of the object. These memory errors are particularly informative because they increase in magnitude as memory delays increase. Thus, errors away from reference axes provide a window into the second-to-second processes that serve to maintain location information in memory. This research will test a mathematical model of these maintenance processes, a model that specifies how a network of neurons can give rise to the types of memory errors humans make. Nine experiments will test this model of how location memory works. The first five experiments will test specific predictions of the model. These experiments will establish whether people make the particular types of memory errors predicted by the model, and whether these errors do, in fact, result from the use of reference axes. The final four experiments will examine the generality of the model to novel situations. For instance, do adults make the same types of memory errors when they are forced to attend to non-target locations during a memory delay? When completed, this project will provide the first formal model of the processes that maintain location information in memory over short-term delays. This model and the associated empirical data may have broad implications. For instance, the model will provide insights into what cues most effectively maintain information in memory. This could lead to an informed re-structuring of the environment for people who have difficulty maintaining information in working memory, such as elderly participants and patients suffering from Alzheimer's Disease. The model could also predict what patterns of error are most likely when people are unskilled (e.g., early in development), and what processes might be most severely disrupted under conditions of stress or strain (e.g., sleep deprivation, impaired visual processing, brain injury).

为了在环境中成功地互动，人们必须准确地记住重要物体的位置，以便在它们不在视线范围内时找到它们。否则，钥匙、鞋子和帽子将永远丢失在典型的家庭或办公室的杂乱中。大多数调查位置记忆特征的研究都集中在人们在记忆中代表什么。例如，人们是表示一组键在电脑左边两英寸的地方，还是表示键在一臂远的地方？虽然这是一个基本问题，但这项研究将探讨一个不同的，但同样重要的问题：人们是如何在记忆中保存位置信息的？这个问题是及时的，因为最近对非人类灵长类动物的研究已经确定了几个有助于记忆中位置信息维持的大脑区域。因此，人们对大脑如何在记忆中保持位置信息的活跃有了越来越多的了解。然而，很少有人类研究与这个新兴的知识库相结合。这项研究将在人类如何记忆位置的行为研究和关于大脑功能的文献之间建立联系。这项研究的核心是人们如何利用每一秒的感知线索来帮助记忆信息。来自各种研究的证据表明，人们依靠可见的参考轴，例如，桌子的边缘，电脑屏幕的边缘，来帮助他们记住目标物体的位置。使用这种感知线索可以帮助将记忆信息保持在正确的范围内（键靠近桌子的左边缘，而不是在计算机上）。然而，这是有代价的，因为记忆在参考轴附近被系统地扭曲了。具体来说，当人们被要求重现隐藏物体的位置时，他们会夸大参考轴与物体实际位置之间的距离。这些内存错误特别具有信息性，因为它们的大小随着内存延迟的增加而增加。因此，远离参考轴的错误为了解用于在内存中维护位置信息的秒对秒进程提供了一个窗口。这项研究将测试这些维持过程的数学模型，该模型详细说明了神经元网络如何引起人类记忆错误的类型。9个实验将测试这个位置记忆如何工作的模型。前五个实验将测试该模型的具体预测。这些实验将确定人们是否会产生模型预测的特定类型的记忆错误，以及这些错误是否实际上是由参考轴的使用造成的。最后四个实验将检验模型在新情况下的普遍性。例如，当成年人在记忆延迟期间被迫注意非目标位置时，他们会犯同样类型的记忆错误吗？完成后，该项目将提供在短期延迟期间在内存中维护位置信息的过程的第一个正式模型。该模型和相关的经验数据可能具有广泛的含义。例如，该模型将提供关于哪些线索最有效地将信息保存在记忆中的见解。对于那些难以在工作记忆中保持信息的人，比如老年参与者和阿尔茨海默氏症患者，这可能会导致环境的知情重构。该模型还可以预测当人们不熟练时（例如，在发育早期）最可能出现的错误模式，以及在压力或紧张的情况下（例如，睡眠剥夺，视觉处理受损，脑损伤），哪些过程可能最严重地中断。