CRCNS Research Proposal: Collaborative Research: Prioritization of memory reactivation for decision-making

我们所做的决定是由我们对以前经历的记忆决定的。事实上，你做出的决定最终可能取决于你的大脑在思考潜在行动的结果时访问了哪些记忆，以及你忽略了哪些记忆。该项目旨在使用功能神经成像来测量支持选择的记忆访问，以便研究哪些记忆是在何时访问的，以及提取这些记忆对人们的选择有何影响，无论是立即还是稍后。了解这些过程将为更好、更统一地理解影响选择的许多不同现象奠定基础--计划、何时养成习惯、梦想的作用以及广告的影响。这也可以提高我们对各种障碍的不适应选择的理解，如沉思、强迫和渴望。这些实验还旨在研究操纵先前经验的结构如何影响这些记忆访问模式，并最终做出选择。除了其科学目标外，该项目还旨在培训年轻科学家掌握一系列跨学科的技术，结合计算和认知神经科学，并服务于多样性，特别是通过促进对这些领域的女性的培训。行动与其后果在空间和时间上可以分开许多步骤。预测这些后果以选择最好的行动需要整合多个中间事件的记忆，这些事件通常不是最初一起经历的。但到目前为止，还缺乏一个原则性的、统一的解释，说明哪些记忆被访问，何时访问，以及哪些被忽视，以支持基于价值的决策。这个项目旨在测试最近的计算理论，该理论正式确定了访问和整合特定内存的方式，以评估选项以及选择的后果。最重要的假设是，大脑顺序地整合不同经历的多个记忆，无论是追溯性的还是前瞻性的，根据先前经验的统计数据优先考虑最有价值的经历。该项目将在人类身上使用功能磁共振成像来验证这一假设，人体将参与解决几个强化学习任务。该项目将利用特定类别的视觉活动来测量获取和审议过程中不同时间点的记忆访问，将这些模式与后续选择进行比较，并测试经验统计结构的操纵是否会影响记忆访问和结果选择。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The decisions we make are shaped by memories of our previous experiences. Indeed, what decision you make may ultimately depend on which memories your brain accesses, and which ones you neglect, in contemplating a potential action's outcome. This project aims to measure memory access in support of choices, using functional neuroimaging, so as to study which memories are accessed when, and how retrieving these memories affects the choices people make, either immediately or later on. Understanding these processes will lay the foundation for a better, more unified understanding of many diverse phenomena affecting choices - planning, when habits arise, the role of dreams, and the impacts of advertising. This could also improve our understanding of maladaptive choice in various disorders, such as rumination, compulsion, and craving. The experiments also aim to examine how manipulating the structure of previous experience affects these memory-access patterns, and ultimately choices. In addition to its scientific aims, the project aims to train young scientists in an interdisciplinary range of techniques, combining computational and cognitive neuroscience, and to serve diversity especially by facilitating training of women in these areas.Actions can be separated from their consequences by many steps in space and time. Anticipating these consequences so as to choose the best actions requires integrating memories of multiple intermediate events, which often were not originally experienced together. But so far there has been a lack of a principled and unified account of which memories are accessed, when, and which are neglected, to support value-based decisions. This project aims to test a recent computational theory that formalizes the ways in which particular memories are accessed and integrated to evaluate options, and the consequences for choice. The overarching hypothesis is that the brain sequentially integrates multiple memories for separate experiences either retroactively or prospectively, prioritizing the most valuable ones depending on the statistics of previous experience. The project will test this hypothesis using functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging in humans that will be engaged in solving several reinforcement-learning tasks. The project will take advantage of category-specific visual activity to measure memory access at different points during acquisition and deliberation, compare these patterns to subsequent choices, and test whether manipulations of the statistical structure of experience affects both memory access and the resulting choices.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.