Controlling the contents of memory: Intentional forgetting at encoding

控制记忆内容：编码时的故意遗忘

• 批准号: RGPIN-2017-05167
• 负责人: Taylor, Tracy
• 金额: $ 1.82万
• 依托单位: Dalhousie University
• 依托单位国家: 加拿大
• 项目类别: Discovery Grants Program - Individual
• 财政年份: 2020
• 资助国家: 加拿大
• 起止时间: 2020-01-01 至 2021-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nserc-crsng.gc.ca/ase-oro/Details-Detailles_eng.asp?id=710715
• 关键词: Controlling; contents; memory; Intentional; forgetting

>> I. BACKGROUND “People always talk about how hard it can be to remember things where they left their keys, or the name of an acquaintance but no one ever talks about how much effort we put into forgetting." - Stephen Carpenter My lab does talk about this. My students and I are fascinated by intentional forgetting forgetting that people do on purpose to select some items for commitment to long-term memory and to discard others. Our research was the first to demonstrate that intentionally forgetting unwanted information is initially more effortful than intentionally remembering. We have argued that this effort is related to an active withdrawal of attention from to-be-forgotten items that also impairs processing of other nearby items. We have identified individual differences that make some people worse at intentionally forgetting than others, while also showing intentional forgetting to be surprisingly robust across a variety of emotional and neutral stimuli. We have further revealed that when intentional forgetting fails and a long-term memory is formed for unwanted information, the resulting memory trace is different than for items that were meant to be remembered. II. OBJECTIVES AND APPROACH We will continue to build on this fruitful program of research by applying methods from the attention and memory literature to study intentional forgetting in young adults. We plan to attain three objectives: 1. Characterize changes in attention to space that occur for mental representations that are formed: A. Bottom-up (by visual presentation). To do this, we will analyze the movement path that the hands and eyes take when acquiring a visual target that follows an instruction to Remember or Forget. B. Top-down (by activation of a conceptual association). To do this, we will capitalize on principles of embodied cognition to reveal changes in spatial associations following instructions to Remember and Forget. 2. Characterize changes that occur to the availability of attention over time, rather than in space, following instructions to Remember and Forget. 3. Explore whether intentions to Forget make participants feel more negative about to-be-forgotten items and, if so, whether these evaluations persist long enough to alter subsequent thinking and decision-making. III. NOVELTY AND SIGNIFICANCE Central to this research are two problems that are fundamental to all cognitive systems those of selection and representation. Using the memory system as a model cognitive system, we will offer unique insights into how selection for long-term memory is achieved, the level(s) of representation upon which this selection operates, and the consequences of this selection for emotional evaluations. In so doing, our research will generate new knowledge about how memory, attention, motor, and emotion systems interact in normal human cognition to achieve and reflect control over the contents of long-term memory. <<

>> I.背景 “人们总是谈论记住他们留下钥匙的地方有多难，或者一个熟人的名字，但从来没有人谈论过我们为忘记付出了多少努力。“--斯蒂芬·卡彭特 我的实验室确实在讨论这个问题。 我和我的学生对有意遗忘很着迷 忘记了人们会故意选择一些项目进行长期记忆，而丢弃其他项目。我们的研究第一次证明，故意忘记不需要的信息比故意记住更容易。我们认为，这种努力与注意力从将要被遗忘的项目上主动撤回有关，这也损害了对附近其他项目的处理。我们已经确定了个体差异，使一些人比其他人更容易故意遗忘，同时也表明故意遗忘在各种情绪和中性刺激中惊人地强大。我们进一步揭示了，当有意遗忘失败，对不需要的信息形成长期记忆时，产生的记忆痕迹与应该记住的项目不同。 二.行动和方法 我们将继续建立在这个富有成效的研究计划，通过应用注意力和记忆文献的方法来研究年轻人的故意遗忘。我们计划实现三个目标： 1. 描述对空间的注意力的变化，这些变化发生在形成的心理表征中： A.自下而上（通过视觉呈现）。为了做到这一点，我们将分析手和眼睛在获取遵循“记住或忘记”指令的视觉目标时所采取的移动路径。 B。自上而下（通过激活概念关联）。为了做到这一点，我们将利用具身认知的原则来揭示空间关联的变化，遵循记住和忘记的指令。 2. 描述注意力随时间而不是空间的变化，遵循记住和忘记的指示。 3. 探索遗忘的意图是否会使参与者对将要被遗忘的项目感到更加消极，如果是这样，这些评估是否持续足够长的时间来改变随后的思维和决策。 三.新奇和重要性 这项研究的核心是两个对所有认知系统都至关重要的问题 选择和代表性。使用记忆系统作为模型认知系统，我们将提供独特的见解，如何选择长期记忆是实现的，这种选择所依据的表征水平，以及这种选择对情绪评估的后果。通过这样做，我们的研究将产生关于记忆，注意力，运动和情感系统如何在正常人类认知中相互作用以实现和反映对长期记忆内容的控制的新知识。 <<