Memory Processing in Primates and Avians

描述(申请人提供)：猕猴(10只)和鸽子(24只)将在4个队列中接受训练和测试，以确定视觉列表记忆的机制，以及列表记忆在保留延迟过程中如何变化。不同的队列将提供经验和任务比较，以扩大这些实验的发现。用1-4张图片的列表(旅行幻灯片)和0-30秒的保留延迟进行实验，将测试一些列表项如何抑制对其他列表项的记忆，以及这种抑制如何随着保留延迟的变化而变化。操作列表项之间的间隔的实验将测试列表项之间的抑制如何随项分离和保留延迟而变化。对记忆性能下降(通过重复)的项目进行的实验将测试这些难以记忆的项目的抑制效果是如何改变的，同时保持相同数量的项目和相同的间隔关系。其他实验将测试这些受试者如何通过制造冲突(即主动干预)来决定测试项目是否在当前记忆列表中。他们将接受测试，以确定以前的列表项目可以干扰(或增强)他们的记忆性能多久，从而确定他们是只使用熟悉度，还是可以接受培训，将他们的决定更多地限制在当前记忆列表中。作为一个整体，这些实验旨在产生收敛的结果，并确定不同的记忆过程如何随着保持延迟而相互作用和变化，以影响哪些列表项被最好地记住(即，序列位置函数)。这一建议的研究对于基本了解两个非语言动物物种的记忆过程具有重要意义，一个物种与人类关系较近(恒河猴)，另一个物种与人类关系较远(鸽子)，并将为记忆如何工作的相关研究(如神经生理学)提供关键的行为学证据。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Rhesus monkeys (10) and pigeons (24) will be trained and tested in 4 cohorts to determine the mechanisms of visual list memory and how list memory changes over the course of retention delay. The different cohorts will provide experiential and task comparisons to broaden the findings from these experiments. Experiments with lists of 1-4 pictures (travel slides) and retention delays of 0-30 seconds will test how some list items inhibit memory of other list items and how this inhibition changes with retention delay. Experiments manipulating intervals between list items will test how inhibition among list items changes with item separation and with retention delay. Experiments with items for which memory performance has been degraded (through repetition) will test how the inhibitory effect of these difficult-to-remember items is altered while at the same time maintaining the same number of items and the same interval relationships. Other experiments will test how these subjects decide whether a test item was in the current memory list by creating conflict (i.e., proactive interference). They will be tested for how far back in time previous list items can interfere (or enhance) with their memory performance, thereby determining whether they use familiarity exclusively or can be trained to restrict their decisions more to the current memory list. As a whole, the experiments are designed to produce converging results and determine how different memorial processes interact and change with retention delay to influence which list items are best remembered (i.e., the serial position function). The research of this proposal should be significant in its contributions to a basic understanding of memorial processes in two nonverbal animal species, one relatively closely related to humans (rhesus monkeys) and one distantly related (pigeons), and will provide behavioral evidence critical to related research (e.g., neurophysiological) on how memory works.