Subjective experience as a basis for reality monitoring over memory

“现实监控”是确定我们的记忆是外部产生的（例如我们感知到的东西的记忆）还是内部产生的（例如思想或想象的记忆）。这个项目的目的是研究神经和计算机制，通过这些机制，记忆现象学的各个方面被应用于现实监控的过程中。重要的是，这种能力在情感和精神病性心理健康障碍中可能会出错。因此，更精确地描述这些机制将有助于我们了解它们如何发生故障，并最终如何针对此类故障进行治疗。研究1（2022年4月至2023年1月）：个体在现实监测策略上是否存在差异？研究方法：在线行为研究，计算建模培训：Python机器学习课程，加速火花机器学习学院（2022年4月至6月）虽然对现实监控性能的个体差异进行了大量研究，但很少对用于实现这一目标的策略的个体差异进行调查。了解这种策略差异可以为心理健康障碍中现实监测缺陷的个性化治疗提供信息。我将调查没有心理意象（一种被称为失语症的疾病）的人在他们用于现实监控记忆的策略上是否有系统性的差异。我将给aphantasic个人和匹配的对照组一个在线现实监测任务。我将使用计算模型来确定所使用的策略是否受到特质意象的调制。我将进行一个验证性的纵向复制，评估个体差异在三周的延迟中是否稳定。研究2（2023年1月至2023年12月）：感觉与判断记忆是真实的的神经机制是什么？研究方法：EEG培训：EEG课程认知判断某事是真实的可以与感觉它是真实的分离，例如当一个梦的记忆感觉是真实的时，即使我们知道这是一个梦。然而，与明确的现实判断相比，人们对现实的现象学感觉的神经基础知之甚少。我将使用脑电图来建立，如果神经的时间过程中的现象学的感觉和明确的判断，记忆是真实的dissociable.Study 3：（2024年1月至2025年1月）皮质再激活反映现实的监测策略？研究方法：fMRI培训：fMRI course记忆提取时编码相关模式的重新激活随记忆的生动性和细节而变化。然而，还不知道分级皮层激活是否支持真实的记忆感觉。使用最近开发的技术来区分定性和定量的个体差异的功能磁共振成像数据，结合多元模式分析，我将评估是否在现实监测的个体差异是由皮质激活的定性或定量差异的支持。结论总体而言，本项目旨在揭示（1）个体在现实监控策略上的差异，以及（2）现实监控感觉和判断可能分离的神经和计算机制。这可以为更精确地治疗现实监测缺陷铺平道路，这些缺陷是专门针对特定个人的现实监测系统发生故障的方式而定制的。

'Reality monitoring' is the process of establishing whether our memories were externally generated (such as a memory of something we perceived), or internally generated (such as a memory of a thought or imagination). This project aims to characterise the neural and computational mechanisms by which aspects of the phenomenology of memory are employed in the process of reality monitoring. Importantly, this ability can go awry in affective and psychotic mental health disorders. Therefore, more precise characterisation of these mechanisms will help us understand how they can malfunction, and ultimately how to target treatment for such malfunctioning.Study 1 (April 2022 - January 2023): Do individuals differ in reality monitoring strategy?Methods: online behavioural study, computational modellingTraining: Python Machine Learning course, Accelerate-Spark Machine Learning Academy (April-June 2022)While there has been much research into individual differences in reality monitoring performance, there has been little investigation into individual differences in the strategies used to accomplish this. Understanding such strategy differences could inform individualised treatment for reality monitoring deficits in mental health disorders. I will investigate whether people with no mental imagery (a condition known as aphantasia) differ systematically in their strategy used for reality monitoring over memory. I will give an online reality monitoring task to aphantasic individuals and matched controls. I will use computational modelling to establish whether strategy used is modulated by trait imagery. I will follow up with a confirmatory and longitudinal replication, assessing whether individual differences are stable over a three-week delay.Study 2 (January 2023 - December 2023): What are the neural mechanisms of the feeling vs. judgement that a memory is real?Methods: EEGTraining: EEG courseThe cognitive judgement that something is real can dissociate from the feeling that it was real, such as when the memory of a dream feels real even when we know it was a dream. However, little is known about the neural underpinnings of the phenomenological feeling of reality compared with explicit reality judgements. I will use EEG to establish if the neural time-courses of the phenomenological feeling and explicit judgement that a memory was real are dissociable.Study 3: (January 2024-January 2025) Does cortical reactivation reflect reality monitoring strategy?Methods: fMRITraining: fMRI courseReactivation of encoding-related patterns at memory retrieval varies parametrically with memory vividness and detail. However, it not known whether graded cortical reactivation supports how real a memory feels. Using a recently-developed technique to distinguish qualitative and quantitative individual differences in fMRI data, combined with multivariate pattern analysis, I will assess whether individual differences in reality monitoring are supported by qualitative or quantitative differences in cortical reactivation. ConclusionOverall, this project aims to characterise the neural and computational mechanisms by which (1) individuals differ in reality monitoring strategy, and (2) reality monitoring feeling and judgement may dissociate. This could pave the way for more precise treatments for reality monitoring deficits which are specifically tailored to the way in which a particular individual's reality monitoring system is malfunctioning.