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

我们所做的决定是由我们以前经历的记忆塑造的。事实上，你做出什么样的决定最终可能取决于你的大脑在考虑一个潜在行动的结果时访问了哪些记忆，而忽略了哪些记忆。本项目旨在通过功能性神经成像来测量支持选择的记忆访问，从而研究哪些记忆在何时被访问，以及检索这些记忆如何影响人们立即或稍后做出的选择。了解这些过程将为更好地、更统一地理解影响选择的许多不同现象奠定基础-计划，习惯何时产生，梦的作用，和广告的影响。这也可以提高我们对各种疾病（例如沉思、强迫和渴望）中适应不良选择的理解。实验还旨在研究如何操纵以前的经验结构影响这些记忆访问模式，并最终选择。除了科学目标外，该项目还旨在培训年轻科学家掌握一系列跨学科技术，将计算和认知神经科学结合起来，并为多样性服务，特别是通过促进对妇女进行这些领域的培训，行动与其后果可以在空间和时间上通过许多步骤分开。要预测这些后果，以便选择最佳行动，就需要整合多个中间事件的记忆，而这些事件通常不是最初一起经历的。但到目前为止，对于哪些记忆被访问、何时被访问以及哪些记忆被忽略，还缺乏一个原则性的统一解释，以支持基于价值的决策。该项目旨在测试最近的计算理论，该理论将特定记忆的访问和整合方式形式化，以评估选项以及选择的后果。最重要的假设是，大脑顺序地整合了多个记忆，用于追溯或前瞻性地分离经验，根据先前经验的统计数据优先考虑最有价值的记忆。该项目将使用人类的功能性磁共振成像来测试这一假设，这些功能性磁共振成像将参与解决几个重复学习任务。该项目将利用特定类别的视觉活动来测量在获取和审议过程中不同点的记忆访问，将这些模式与随后的选择进行比较，并测试对经验的统计结构的操纵是否影响记忆访问和由此产生的选择。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并被认为值得通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准。

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.