scholarly journals Formation of a long-term memory for visuomotor adaptation following only a few trials of practice

2015 ◽  
Vol 114 (2) ◽  
pp. 969-977 ◽  
Author(s):  
David M. Huberdeau ◽  
Adrian M. Haith ◽  
John W. Krakauer

The term savings refers to faster motor adaptation upon reexposure to a previously experienced perturbation, a phenomenon thought to reflect the existence of a long-term motor memory. It is commonly assumed that sustained practice during the first perturbation exposure is necessary to create this memory. Here we sought to test this assumption by determining the minimum amount of experience necessary during initial adaptation to a visuomotor rotation to bring about savings the following day. Four groups of human subjects experienced 2, 5, 10, or 40 trials of a counterclockwise 30° cursor rotation during reaching movements on one day and were retested the following day to assay for savings. Groups that experienced five trials or more of adaptation on day 1 showed clear savings on day 2. Subjects in all groups learned significantly more from the first rotation trial on day 2 than on day 1, but this learning rate advantage was maintained only in groups that had reached asymptote during the initial exposure. Additional experiments revealed that savings occurred when the magnitude, but not the direction, of the rotation differed across exposures, and when a 5-min break, rather than an overnight one, separated the first and second exposure. The overall pattern of savings we observe across conditions can be explained as rapid retrieval of the state of learning attained during the first exposure rather than as modulation of sensitivity to error. We conclude that a long-term memory for compensating for a perturbation can be rapidly acquired and rapidly retrieved.

2008 ◽  
Vol 100 (5) ◽  
pp. 2948-2955 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wilsaan M. Joiner ◽  
Maurice A. Smith

Extensive theoretical, psychophysical, and neurobiological work has focused on the mechanisms by which short-term learning develops into long-term memory. Better understanding of these mechanisms may lead to the ability to improve the efficiency of training procedures. A key phenomenon in the formation of long-term memory is the effect of over learning on retention—discovered by Ebbinghaus in 1885: when the initial training period in a task is prolonged even beyond what is necessary for good immediate recall, long-term retention improves. Although this over learning effect has received considerable attention as a phenomenon in psychology research, the mechanisms governing this process are not well understood, and the ability to predict the benefit conveyed by varying degrees of over learning does not yet exist. Here we studied the relationship between the duration of an initial training period and the amount of retention 24 h later for the adaptation of human reaching arm movements to a novel force environment. We show that in this motor adaptation task, the amount of long-term retention is predicted not by the overall performance level achieved during the training period but rather by the level of a specific component process in a multi-rate model of short-term memory formation. These findings indicate that while multiple learning processes determine the ability to learn a motor adaptation, only one provides a gateway to long-term memory formation. Understanding the dynamics of this key learning process may allow for the rational design of training and rehabilitation paradigms that maximize the long-term benefit of each session.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Agustín Solano ◽  
Luis A. Riquelme ◽  
Daniel Perez-Chada ◽  
Valeria Della-Maggiore

AbstractThe precise coupling between slow oscillations (SO) and spindles is critical for sleep-dependent consolidation of declarative memories. Here, we examined whether this mechanism also operates in the stabilization of human motor memories during NREM sleep. We hypothesized that if the coupling of these oscillations is instrumental to motor memory consolidation then only SO-coupled spindles would predict long-term memory. We found that sleep enhanced long-term memory retention by 34%. Motor learning increased the density of spindles but not their frequency, duration or amplitude during NREM sleep. This modulation was manifested locally over the hemisphere contralateral to the trained hand. Although motor learning did not affect the density of SOs, it substantially modulated the spindle-SO coupling in an inter-hemispheric manner, suggesting it may rather increase the ability of slow oscillations to promote thalamic spindles. The fact that only coupled spindles predicted long-term memory points to the association of these oscillations as a fundamental signature of motor memory consolidation. Our work provides evidence in favor of a common mechanism at the basis of the stabilization of declarative and non-declarative memories.


1996 ◽  
Vol 75 (4) ◽  
pp. 1730-1737 ◽  
Author(s):  
E. Bonda ◽  
M. Petrides ◽  
A. Evans

1. The aim of this study was to investigate the neural systems involved in the memory processing of experiences through touch. 2. Regional cerebral blood flow was measured with positron emission tomography by means of the water bolus H2(15)O methodology in human subjects as they performed tasks involving different levels of tactual memory. In one of the experimental tasks, the subjects had to palpate nonsense shapes to match each one to a previously learned set, thus requiring constant reference to long-term memory. The other experimental task involved judgements of the recent recurrence of shapes during the scanning period. A set of three control tasks was used to control for the type of exploratory movements and sensory processing inherent in the two experimental tasks. 3. Comparisons of the distribution of activity between the experimental and the control tasks were carried out by means of the subtraction method. In relation to the control conditions, the two experimental tasks requiring memory resulted in significant changes within the posteroventral insula and the central opercular region. In addition, the task requiring recall from long-term memory yielded changes in the perirhinal cortex. 4. The above findings demonstrated that a ventrally directed parietoinsular pathway, leading to the posteroventral insula and the perirhinal cortex, constitutes a system by which long-lasting representations of tactual experiences are formed. It is proposed that the posteroventral insula is involved in tactual feature analysis, by analogy with the similar role of the inferotemporal cortex in vision, whereas the perirhinal cortex is further involved in the integration of these features into long-lasting representations of somatosensory experiences.


2016 ◽  
Vol 39 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mary C. Potter

AbstractRapid serial visual presentation (RSVP) of words or pictured scenes provides evidence for a large-capacity conceptual short-term memory (CSTM) that momentarily provides rich associated material from long-term memory, permitting rapid chunking (Potter 1993; 2009; 2012). In perception of scenes as well as language comprehension, we make use of knowledge that briefly exceeds the supposed limits of working memory.


2020 ◽  
Vol 29 (4) ◽  
pp. 710-727
Author(s):  
Beula M. Magimairaj ◽  
Naveen K. Nagaraj ◽  
Alexander V. Sergeev ◽  
Natalie J. Benafield

Objectives School-age children with and without parent-reported listening difficulties (LiD) were compared on auditory processing, language, memory, and attention abilities. The objective was to extend what is known so far in the literature about children with LiD by using multiple measures and selective novel measures across the above areas. Design Twenty-six children who were reported by their parents as having LiD and 26 age-matched typically developing children completed clinical tests of auditory processing and multiple measures of language, attention, and memory. All children had normal-range pure-tone hearing thresholds bilaterally. Group differences were examined. Results In addition to significantly poorer speech-perception-in-noise scores, children with LiD had reduced speed and accuracy of word retrieval from long-term memory, poorer short-term memory, sentence recall, and inferencing ability. Statistically significant group differences were of moderate effect size; however, standard test scores of children with LiD were not clinically poor. No statistically significant group differences were observed in attention, working memory capacity, vocabulary, and nonverbal IQ. Conclusions Mild signal-to-noise ratio loss, as reflected by the group mean of children with LiD, supported the children's functional listening problems. In addition, children's relative weakness in select areas of language performance, short-term memory, and long-term memory lexical retrieval speed and accuracy added to previous research on evidence-based areas that need to be evaluated in children with LiD who almost always have heterogenous profiles. Importantly, the functional difficulties faced by children with LiD in relation to their test results indicated, to some extent, that commonly used assessments may not be adequately capturing the children's listening challenges. Supplemental Material https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.12808607


2011 ◽  
Vol 70 (1) ◽  
pp. 35-39 ◽  
Author(s):  
Muriel Fanget ◽  
Catherine Thevenot ◽  
Caroline Castel ◽  
Michel Fayol

In this study, we used a paradigm recently developed ( Thevenot, Fanget, & Fayol, 2007 ) to determine whether 10-year-old children solve simple addition problems by retrieval of the answer from long-term memory or by calculation procedures. Our paradigm is unique in that it does not rely on reaction times or verbal reports, which are known to potentially bias the results, especially in children. Rather, it takes advantage of the fact that calculation procedures degrade the memory traces of the operands, so that it is more difficult to recognize them when they have been involved in the solution of an addition problem by calculation rather than by retrieval. The present study sharpens the current conclusions in the literature and shows that, when the sum of addition problems is up to 10, children mainly use retrieval, but when it is greater than 10, they mainly use calculation procedures.


2010 ◽  
Vol 24 (4) ◽  
pp. 249-252 ◽  
Author(s):  
Márk Molnár ◽  
Roland Boha ◽  
Balázs Czigler ◽  
Zsófia Anna Gaál

This review surveys relevant and recent data of the pertinent literature regarding the acute effect of alcohol on various kinds of memory processes with special emphasis on working memory. The characteristics of different types of long-term memory (LTM) and short-term memory (STM) processes are summarized with an attempt to relate these to various structures in the brain. LTM is typically impaired by chronic alcohol intake but according to some data a single dose of ethanol may have long lasting effects if administered at a critically important age. The most commonly seen deleterious acute effect of alcohol to STM appears following large doses of ethanol in conditions of “binge drinking” causing the “blackout” phenomenon. However, with the application of various techniques and well-structured behavioral paradigms it is possible to detect, albeit occasionally, subtle changes of cognitive processes even as a result of a low dose of alcohol. These data may be important for the consideration of legal consequences of low-dose ethanol intake in conditions such as driving, etc.


Author(s):  
Ian Neath ◽  
Jean Saint-Aubin ◽  
Tamra J. Bireta ◽  
Andrew J. Gabel ◽  
Chelsea G. Hudson ◽  
...  

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document