KDI: Discrete Representations in Working Memory: Developmental, Neuropsychological, and Computational Investigations

这个项目旨在进一步加深我们对工作记忆背后的神经表征的理解。工作记忆是指在复杂的认知任务（如解决问题和计划）中对信息的主动维护。 研究人员研究了工作记忆系统的独特需求如何在学习和发展过程中塑造其表征，以及这些表征如何影响整个认知系统对工作记忆的使用。 他们对这一过程的主要见解来源将来自计算分析，该分析将用于整合和探索神经生物学以及发育和成人认知的相关发现。 主要的假设是，为了在延迟和面对干扰时保持信息处于活跃状态，工作记忆表征应该是离散的。 离散表示只允许有限的可能状态集，而不是表示连续状态。 例如，从1到100的整数形成一个离散的集合，与此范围内的真实的数字形成对比。 离散性赋予表示鲁棒性的度量，因为少量的“噪声”可以通过将观察到的状态解释为最近的离散状态来克服。 从离散性的中心属性出发，还有许多其他属性。 例如，离散表征应该更明确，更容易用语言表达，更好地感知或执行一系列步骤，更容易获得意识。 所有这些性质都有组成部分，所提出的研究是探索他们都遵循更基本的性质的概念。 该项目的最初目标是通过实验研究建立工作记忆表征确实是离散的假设的有效性。 这将通过探索这一假设的一个关键行为后果来完成：工作记忆表征应该比其他表征更明确。 这一预测将与一组现有的经验范式，阐明了变量，影响工作记忆系统，包括发育年龄，延迟，双任务的要求，和脑损伤进行调查。 工作记忆在大多数复杂的人类行为中起着核心作用，因为工作记忆在任何涉及多个任务的任务中都是必需的，也就是在时间上延长的注意力集中。 这类任务在整个社会都很重要，而且普遍存在，包括：经济、政治和军事规划;空中交通管制;科学研究等等。 理解工作记忆系统中表征的本质，以及理解人们如何学会使用工作记忆来服务于复杂行为，这是至关重要的。 这项研究将推进我们在这一重要领域的知识，并可能提供深入了解脑损伤后的工作记忆康复技术和协助儿童工作记忆发展的技术。

This project aims to futher our understanding of the neural representations that underlie working memory. Working memory refers to the active maintenance of information in the service of complex cognitive tasks such as problem solving and planning. The team of investigator with study how the unique demands placed on the working memory system shape its representations during learning and development, and how these representations affect the use of working memory by the cognitive system as a whole. Their primary source of insight into this process will come from a computational analysis, which will be used to integrate and explore relevant findings from neurobiology and developmental and adult cognition. The primary hypothesis is that to maintain information in an active state over delays and in the face of interference, working memory representations should be discrete. A discrete representation admits to only a finite set of possible states, rather than representing continuous states. For example, the integers from 1 to 100 form a discrete set, in contrast to the real numbers in this range. Discreteness imparts a measure of robustness to the representation because small amounts of "noise" can be overcome by interpreting an observed state as the nearest discrete stat. From the central property of discreteness, a number of other properties follow. For example, discrete representations should be more categorical, more easily verbalize, better for perceiving or performing a sequence of steps, and more accessible to awareness. All these properties have component of the proposed research is to explore the idea that they all follow from the more basic property of dicreteness. The initial goal of the project will be establish through experimental studies the validity of the hypothesis that working memory representations are indeed discrete. This will be done by exploring a key behavioral consequence of this hypothesis: working memory representations should be more categorical than other representations. This predicition will be investigated with a set of existing empirical paradigms that have elucidated variables that affect the working memory system, including developmental age, delay, dual-task demands, and brain damage. Working memory plays a central role in most accounts of complex human behavior, because working memory is required in any task that involves multiple stos ir a temporally extended focus of attention. This kinds of tasks are important and pervasive throughout society, including: economic, political, and military planning; air-traffic control; and scientific research, to name just a few. It is essential to understand the nature of the representations in the working memory system and to understand how people learn to use working memory in the service of complex behavior. This research will advance our knowledge in this important area, and may provide insight into techniques for rehabilitation of working memory following brain injury and techniques for assisting the development of working memory in children.