Evidence for Object-Place binding in pigeons in a sequence-learning procedure

Mapping Intimacies ◽

10.31234/osf.io/fnjpr ◽

2019 ◽

Author(s):

Aaron Blaisdell

Keyword(s):

Response Time ◽

Sequence Learning ◽

Food Reinforcement ◽

Regular Sequence ◽

Feature Binding ◽

Object Location ◽

Learning Effects ◽

Time Costs ◽

Learning Procedure ◽

Location Binding

We studied object-location binding in pigeons using a sequence learning procedure. A sequence of four objects was presented, one at a time at one of four locations on a touchscreen. A single peck at the object ended the trial, and food reinforcement was delivered intermittently. In Experiment 1, a between-subjects design was used to present objects, locations, or both in a regular sequence or randomly. Response time costs on nonreinforced probe tests on which object order, location order, or both were disrupted revealed sequence learning effects. Pigeons encoded location order when it was consistent, but not object order when it alone was consistent. When both were consistent, pigeons encoded both, and also showed evidence of object-location binding. In Experiment 2, two groups of pigeons received training on sequences where the same object always appeared at the same location. For some pigeons a consistent sequence was used while for others sequence order was randomized. Only when sequence order was consistent was object-location binding found. These experiments are the first demonstrations of strong and lasting feature binding in pigeons.

Download Full-text

Patients with Mild Cognitive Impairment Show Lower Visual Short-Term Memory Performance in Feature Binding Tasks

Dementia and Geriatric Cognitive Disorders Extra ◽

10.1159/000455831 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 7 (1) ◽

pp. 74-86 ◽

Cited By ~ 6

Author(s):

Raju P. Sapkota ◽

Ian van der Linde ◽

Nirmal Lamichhane ◽

Tirthalal Upadhyaya ◽

Shahina Pardhan

Keyword(s):

Cognitive Impairment ◽

Mild Cognitive Impairment ◽

Short Term Memory ◽

Feature Binding ◽

Object Location ◽

Short Term ◽

Cognitive Changes ◽

Term Memory ◽

Visual Short Term Memory ◽

Location Binding

Background: Early cognitive changes in people at risk of developing dementia may be detected using behavioral tests that examine the performance of typically affected brain areas, such as the hippocampi. An important cognitive function supported by the hippocampi is memory binding, in which object features are associated to create a unified percept. Aim: To compare visual short-term memory (VSTM) binding performance for object names, locations, and identities between a participant group known to be at higher risk of developing dementia (mild cognitive impairment [MCI]) and healthily aging controls. Methods: Ten MCI and 10 control participants completed five VSTM tests that differed in their requirement of remembering bound or unbound object names, locations, and identities, along with a standard neuropsychological test (Addenbrooke’s Cognitive Examination [ACE]-III). Results: The performance of the MCI participants was selectively and significantly lower than that of the healthily aging controls for memory tasks that required object-location or name-location binding. Conclusion: Tasks that measure unimodal (object-location) and crossmodal (name-location) binding performance appear to be particularly effective for the detection of early cognitive changes in those at higher risk of developing dementia due to Alzheimer’s disease.

Download Full-text

Memory precision of object-location binding is unimpaired in APOE ε4-carriers with spatial navigation deficits

10.1101/2020.12.18.423245 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Helena M. Gellersen ◽

Gillian Coughlan ◽

Michael Hornberger ◽

Jon S. Simons

Keyword(s):

Early Detection ◽

Visual Memory ◽

Spatial Navigation ◽

Memory Task ◽

Spatial Position ◽

Feature Binding ◽

Object Location ◽

Ε4 Allele ◽

Location Binding ◽

Sensitive Marker

AbstractResearch suggests that tests of memory fidelity, feature binding and spatial navigation are promising for early detection of subtle behavioural changes related to Alzheimer’s disease (AD). In the absence of longitudinal data, one way of testing the early detection potential of cognitive tasks is through the comparison of individuals at different genetic risk for AD. Most studies have done so using samples aged 70 years or older. Here, we tested whether memory fidelity of long-term object-location binding may be a sensitive marker even among cognitively healthy individuals in their mid-60s by comparing participants at low and higher risk based on presence of the ε4-allele of the apolipoprotein gene (n=26 ε3ε3 and n=20 ε3ε4 carriers). We used a continuous report paradigm in a visual memory task that required participants to recreate the spatial position of objects in a scene. We employed mixture modelling to estimate the two distinct memory processes that underpin the trial-by-trial variation in localisation errors: retrieval success which indexes the proportion of trials where participants recalled any information about an object’s position and the precision with which participants retrieved this information. Prior work has shown that these memory paradigms that separate retrieval success from precision are capable of detecting subtle differences in mnemonic fidelity even when retrieval success could not. Nonetheless, a Bayesian analysis found good evidence that ε3ε4 carriers did not remember fewer object locations (F(1, 42)=.450, p=.506, BF01=3.02), nor was their precision for the spatial position of objects reduced compared to ε3ε3 carriers (F(1, 42)=.12, p=.726, BF01=3.19). Importantly, ε3ε4-carriers from the same sample have previously been reported to exhibit wayfinding deficits in a spatial navigation task (Coughlan et al. 2019, PNAS, 116(19)). The sensitivity of memory fidelity tasks may therefore not extend to individuals with one ε4-allele in their early to mid-60s. These results provide further support to prior proposals that spatial navigation may be a sensitive marker for the earliest AD-dependent cognitive changes, even before episodic memory. More research in preclinical AD is needed to confirm this hypothesis by direct comparison of memory fidelity and spatial navigation tasks.

Download Full-text

Conceptual distinctiveness does not improve visual working memory for objects but aids object-location binding

10.31234/osf.io/j6upw ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Yuri Markov ◽

Igor Utochkin

Keyword(s):

Working Memory ◽

Visual Working Memory ◽

Competitive Interactions ◽

Object Location ◽

Location Information ◽

Limited Capacity ◽

Common Features ◽

Categorical Information ◽

Location Binding ◽

Different Sources

Visual working memory (VWM) is prone to interference from stored items competing for its limited capacity. These competitive interactions can arise from different sources. For example, one such source is poor item distinctiveness causing a failure to discriminate between items sharing common features. Another source of interference is imperfect binding, a problem of determining which of the remembered features belonged to which object or which item was in which location. In two experiments, we studied how the conceptual distinctiveness of real-world objects (i.e., whether the objects belong to the same or different basic categories) affects VWM for objects and object-location binding. In Experiment 1, we found that distinctiveness did not affect memory for object identities or for locations, but low-distinctive objects were more frequently reported at “swapped” locations that originally went with different objects. In Experiment 2 we found evidence that the effect of distinctiveness on the object-location swaps was due to the use of categorical information for binding. In particular, we found that observers swapped the location of a tested object with another object from the same category more frequently than with any of the objects from another category. This suggests that observers can use some coarse category-location information when objects are conceptually distinct. Taken together, our findings suggest that object distinction and object-location binding act upon different components of VWM.

Download Full-text

Sequence learning is driven by improvements in motor planning

Journal of Neurophysiology ◽

10.1152/jn.00041.2019 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 121 (6) ◽

pp. 2088-2100 ◽

Cited By ~ 10

Author(s):

Giacomo Ariani ◽

Jörn Diedrichsen

Keyword(s):

Sequence Learning ◽

Forced Response ◽

Learning Effects ◽

Production Task ◽

Motor Execution ◽

Motor Sequence ◽

Single Action ◽

Online Planning ◽

Sequence Production ◽

Planning Processes

The ability to perform complex sequences of movements quickly and accurately is critical for many motor skills. Although training improves performance in a large variety of motor sequence tasks, the precise mechanisms behind such improvements are poorly understood. Here we investigated the contribution of single-action selection, sequence preplanning, online planning, and motor execution to performance in a discrete sequence production task. Five visually presented numbers cued a sequence of five finger presses, which had to be executed as quickly and accurately as possible. To study how sequence planning influenced sequence production, we manipulated the amount of time that participants were given to prepare each sequence by using a forced-response paradigm. Over 4 days, participants were trained on 10 sequences and tested on 80 novel sequences. Our results revealed that participants became faster in selecting individual finger presses. They also preplanned three or four sequence items into the future, and the speed of preplanning improved for trained, but not for untrained, sequences. Because preplanning capacity remained limited, the remaining sequence elements had to be planned online during sequence execution, a process that also improved with sequence-specific training. Overall, our results support the view that motor sequence learning effects are best characterized by improvements in planning processes that occur both before and concurrently with motor execution. NEW & NOTEWORTHY Complex skills often require the production of sequential movements. Although practice improves performance, it remains unclear how these improvements are achieved. Our findings show that learning effects in a sequence production task can be attributed to an enhanced ability to plan upcoming movements. These results shed new light on planning processes in the context of movement sequences and have important implications for our understanding of the neural mechanisms that underlie skill acquisition.

Download Full-text

A comparison of single-session focused attention meditation and computerised attention task instantaneous effects on cognitive control in sequence learning

10.31234/osf.io/f2zb8 ◽

2018 ◽

Author(s):

Russell Weili Chan ◽

Maarten Alberto Immink ◽

Kurt Lushington

Keyword(s):

General Practice ◽

Reaction Time ◽

Sequence Learning ◽

Attention Allocation ◽

Focused Attention ◽

Learning Effects ◽

Single Session ◽

Top Down ◽

Attention Task ◽

And Control

Chan et al. (2017) demonstrated that top-down control states established in FAM persist to influence subsequent sequence learning through increased stimulus-based planning. To test if top-down control influences on attention allocation and contribute to sequence learning effects of FAM, we compared against a computerised attention task (CAT). We investigated if effort, arousal or pleasure associated with FAM or CAT, explained the influence on sequence learning. Relative to Control, FAM and CAT resulted in shorter reaction time (RT) in the SRTT. FAM resulted in a greater rate of improvement than both CAT and control across training blocks of the SRTT, aligned with general practice benefits associated with reliance on stimulus-based planning. Neither effort, arousal or pleasure associated with FAM, CAT or control conditions correlated with SRTT performance or learning indices. Enhanced sequence learning following FAM is attributed to increased top-down control states established by FAM that transfer to subsequent sequence learning.

Download Full-text

Sequence learning is driven by improvements in motor planning

10.1101/523423 ◽

2019 ◽

Author(s):

Giacomo Ariani ◽

Jörn Diedrichsen

Keyword(s):

Skill Acquisition ◽

Sequence Learning ◽

Forced Response ◽

Learning Effects ◽

Motor Execution ◽

Motor Sequence ◽

Single Action ◽

Online Planning ◽

Sequence Production ◽

Planning Processes

AbstractThe ability to perform complex sequences of movements quickly and accurately is critical for many motor skills. While training improves performance in a large variety of motor-sequence tasks, the precise mechanisms behind such improvements are poorly understood. Here we investigated the contribution of single-action selection, sequence pre-planning, online planning, and motor execution to performance in a discrete sequence production (DSP) task. Five visually-presented numbers cued a sequence of five finger presses, which had to be executed as quickly and accurately as possible. To study how sequence planning influenced sequence production, we manipulated the amount of time that participants were given to prepare each sequence by using a forced-response paradigm. Over 4 days, participants were trained on 10 sequences and tested on 80 novel sequences. Our results revealed that participants became faster in selecting individual finger presses. They also preplanned 3-4 sequence items into the future, and the speed of pre-planning improved for trained, but not for untrained, sequences. Because pre-planning capacity remained limited, the remaining sequence elements had to be planned online during sequence execution, a process that also improved with sequence-specific training. Overall, our results support the view that motor sequence learning effects are best characterized by improvements in planning processes that occur both before and concurrently with motor execution.New & NoteworthyComplex skills often require the production of sequential movements. While practice improves performance, it remains unclear how these improvements are achieved. Our findings show that learning effects in a sequence production task can be attributed to an enhanced ability to plan upcoming movements. These results shed new light on planning processes in the context of movement sequences, and have important implications for our understanding of the neural mechanisms that underlie skill acquisition.

Download Full-text

Evidence for age‐related deficits in object‐location binding during place recognition

Hippocampus ◽

10.1002/hipo.23099 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 29 (10) ◽

pp. 971-979 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Veronica Muffato ◽

Christopher Hilton ◽

Chiara Meneghetti ◽

Rossana De Beni ◽

Jan M. Wiener

Keyword(s):

Object Location ◽

Place Recognition ◽

Age Related ◽

Location Binding

Download Full-text

Forgetting What Was Where: The Fragility of Object-Location Binding

PLoS ONE ◽

10.1371/journal.pone.0048214 ◽

2012 ◽

Vol 7 (10) ◽

pp. e48214 ◽

Cited By ~ 43

Author(s):

Yoni Pertzov ◽

Mia Yuan Dong ◽

Muy-Cheng Peich ◽

Masud Husain

Keyword(s):

Object Location ◽

Location Binding

Download Full-text

Object-Guided Spatial Selection in Touch Without Concurrent Changes in the Perceived Location of the Hands

Experimental Psychology (formerly Zeitschrift für Experimentelle Psychologie) ◽

10.1027/1618-3169/a000180 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 60 (1) ◽

pp. 64-70 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Helge Gillmeister ◽

Simona Cantarella ◽

Ana Ioana Gheorghiu ◽

Julia Adler

Keyword(s):

Response Time ◽

Visual Cues ◽

Spatial Location ◽

Attentional Demands ◽

Spatial Selection ◽

Common Object ◽

Spatial Framework ◽

Time Costs ◽

Relative Coordinates

In an endogenous cueing paradigm with central visual cues, observers made speeded responses to tactile targets at the hands, which were either close together or far apart, and holding either two separate objects or one common object between them. When the hands were far apart, the response time costs associated with attending to the wrong hand were reduced when attention had to be shifted along one object jointly held by both hands compared to when it was shifted over the same distance but across separate objects. Similar reductions in attentional costs were observed when the hands were placed closer together, suggesting that processing at one hand is less prioritized over that at another when the hands can be “grouped” by virtue of arising from the same spatial location or from the same object. Probes of perceived hand locations throughout the task showed that holding a common object decreased attentional separability without decreasing the perceived separation between the hands. Our findings suggest that tactile events at the hands may be represented in a spatial framework that flexibly adapts to (object-guided) attentional demands, while their relative coordinates are simultaneously preserved.

Download Full-text